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COPYRIGHT DEPOSrr 



MERE HINTS 

MORAL AND SOCIAL 



Rev. JOHN E. GRAHAM 



Vt 



<oA 



Copyright, 1910 

by 

Rev. John E. Graham 

Baltimore 



BALTIMORE CITY 

PRINTING AND BINDING 

COMPANY 



©CI.A273 



CONTENTS. 



"Little Foxes," or Dangerous Beginnings.... 7 

Conscience and Casuistry 11 

Extra-Legal Compensation 14 

Justice Far-Reaching 17 

Binding Force of Taxation Laws 20 

Big and Little Malefactors 23 

Some Important Factors in the Formation of 

Public Opinion 26 

Hero- Worship 29 

The Spirit of Discontent 32 

The Duty of Reparation 35 

Is the Corporation an Irresponsible Agent ? . . . . 38 

The Milk of Human Kindness 42 

The Uses of Pain 45 

Parental Responsibility 47 

A Plea for the Erring £0 

Literary Influences .53 

The Stage — Past and Present 56 

Deeds vs. Words 60 

The Human Octopus 63 

Sure Test of True Goodness 65 

Thanksgiving 68 

Dives and Lazarus 71 

Usury 74 

Hypnotism and Crime 76 

Ethics of Suicide 79 

Bright Side of the World 83 

Taking Stock 86 

The Great Brotherhood 89 



Nature's Law of Compensation 91 

The Body Social and Its Members 94 

Moral Motor Forces 97 

Conceit and Flippancy Born of Shallowness . . . 100 

Mental Thoroughness 103 

Dr. Jekyll and Mr. Hyde 106 

Is Honesty the Best "Policy" ? 109 

More Anent Honest Men and Shams 112 

The Power of Associations 116 

Slanderous Tongues 118 

Woman's Power for Good 121 

Self- Appointed Judges 124 

Moral Backbone 126 

The Sacredness of an Oath 129 

Force of Example 132 

The Moral Feature in Journalism 135 

The Philosophy of Trifles 138 

Doing Our Own Thinking 140 

Getting the Proper Focus 144 

The American Snob Abroad 147 

Malicious Innuendoes 150 

The Best Philanthropy 153 

The Moth and the Flame 155 

Groping After the Mysterious 158 

Man's Inhumanity to Man 161 

The Moral Element in Education 164 

Criminal Ignorance 165 

Love of One's Work 168 

Ideals 170 

Good Manners and Etiquette 173 

The Canker— Selfishness 177 

Honest Thinking and Doing 180 

Some Queer Business Ethics 183 

The Buried Talent 186 

Apart From the Crowd 189 



FOREWORD 

THIS book is a re-print of a series of moral 
and social essays which have been appear- 
ing weekly for the past fifteen months in the 
editorial columns of The (Baltimore) Sun, with 
whose kind permission they are now given to 
the public in collected form. By way of excuse 
for re-publishing the articles the writer may be 
pardoned for saying that, on their first appear- 
ance, they were very favorably received by The 
Sun's readers many of whom have been urging 
their re-publication in book-form. Were the 
matter of the book something entirely new and 
untried, the writer would be rather diffident about 
sending it forth ; but the fact that its contents 
have been already tested and approved, naturally 
inspires him with confidence. As the articles 
were written originally for a daily journal, they 
are, of course, necessarily brief and condensed, 
and for this reason it was deemed proper to give 
them the somewhat unpretentious title of just 
mere "Hints." However, this very brevity or 
terseness, and the condensing of thought, may 
prove one of their best features. The aim has 
been to give "multum in parvo." And certainly 
whatever other criticisms may be justly made of 
the articles, the charge of diffuseness is not one 
of them. I have made no changes in the papers, 
but thought it best to give them without altera- 
tion or elaboration, in the order in which they 
first appeared. 



Briefly, the articles are the principles of the 
strenuous life applied to social morality. And 
these principles of the strenuous moral life are 
at bottom nothing less than the principles of the 
Great Master Who declared that "the kingdom 
of Heaven suffers violence, and the violent bear 
it away." The saving cry of modern society is 
not "Back to Plato," or "Back to Kant," but 
"Back to Christ and His Gospel." And it is in 
the hope of helping, in some small degree, to 
bring about the realization of this truth that we 
send forth the booklet. 

The writer takes this occasion to express his 
thanks for the courtesy extended him by The 
Sun management, and his deep obligations to 
Mr. John J. Nelligan, Vice-President of the Safe 
Deposit and Trust Company of Baltimore, 
through whose urging the papers were first writ- 
ten and published. 

JOHN E. GRAHAM. 

Baltimore. 



[June 30, 1909.] 

"LITTLE FOXES," OR DANGEROUS 
BEGINNINGS 

"f* ATCH us the little foxes that destroy the 
^^ vines. " Long years ago, in these words, 
the wise and experienced author of the Book of 
Canticles gave us the key to the philosophy of 
ethics. It is a saying not often quoted, or even 
noticed, but one nevertheless pregnant with 
meaning; and when we term it the key to the 
philosophy of life, we are uttering no mere 
empty phrase, but rather an exact truth. For, 
like the great river and its source, the big things 
and events of life almost invariably trace their 
origin back to things which in themselves seem 
of trifling or minor importance. 

By way of illustration, how few are the men 
of enduring fame who ever arrived at greatness 
in a single bound ! And so with governments — 
the most stable are those of slow, but sure, de- 
velopment. As the old adage has it, "Rome 
was not built in a day." Men and nations of 
mushroom growth are, as a rule, of short dura- 
tion. Like the frail, perishable flower, they 
spring up suddenly, and just as suddenly vanish. 
So, too, with the pleader. The man who jumps 
at conclusions will never succeed as a logician, 
because the value and force of an argument 
often depend precisely on the "little things" that 



8 Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 

escape his notice. The successful reasoner is 
the one who minds the little things in an argu- 
ment; who is close and patient; who proceeds 
cautiously, step by step, marking every link in 
the chain. The true scientist is the laborious, 
painstaking investigator, who neglects not even 
the smallest minutiae of his subject. And the 
same is true of the historian, the physician, the 
strategist, and men in every walk and profes- 
sion of life. They can never attain to a posi- 
tion of real worth or eminence without the clos- 
est attention to details. Some of the greatest 
revolutions and dynastic upheavals in the world's 
history have arisen from apparently trifling 
causes. Of course, it is true that the effect can- 
not be greater than the cause — there must be a 
proportion between them — but none the less it is 
often these "little things" that give the impetus, 
and without a knowledge of them it is impossi- 
ble to understand and interpret aright the course 
of historical events. We know how small a 
spark is required to start a great fire. It is not 
the heavy showers that are always of greatest 
benefit to the soil, but rather the slow and steady 
rainfall. "Drops will (even) pierce the stubborn 
flint — not by force, but often falling." 

There is a story told of Michael Angelo which 
is very much to the point. After laboring long 
and patiently over one of his famous master- 
pieces, it was at length completed. At least 
so thought the uninitiated layman. But not 
so the eminent artist. Still unsatisfied, he kept 
on working at it day after day, chiseling and 



Mdre Hints: Moral and Social. 9 

polishing, till one of his friends who had ob- 
served him concluded that he was wasting his 
precious time on trifles, and took the liberty to 
tell him so. The answer is well worth record- 
ing as one of the most brilliant gems of worldly 
wisdom : "Trifles," he replied, "make perfection ; 
and perfection is no trifle." 

And so it is likewise in the moral order. 
Here, too, it is the trifles that make perfection; 
it is the seemingly little things that, taken in 
the mass, make the difference between the good 
man and the bad man. As the Scriptures tell 
us: "He that despiseth small things shall fall 
by little and little," and "He that is unjust in 
that which is of small account will be unjust 
also in things of greater importance." No one 
ever attains to virtuous eminence, or sinks to 
the lowest depths of vice, at a single leap. Both 
eminent virtue and notorious wickedness are of 
slow growth. It is the oft-repeated little acts 
of goodness that finally make the solidly good 
man, and it is the frequent repetition of little 
acts of vice that eventually develops the case- 
hardened criminal. Judas Iscariot did not be- 
come the villain he was in a single day. Doubt- 
less he started out like most of us — neither over- 
good nor over-bad. He began with petty thefts, 
and repeated them again and again till he had 
got beyond his depth and formed within him- 
self a deep-rooted attachment to vice. Avarice 
was his ruling passion, and he indulged it, at first 
in small matters, afterward in things of greater 
moment, until by slow, and perhaps almost im- 



10 Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 

perceptible degrees he became so lost to every 
sense of honor and loyalty as to sell his Master 
for thirty pieces of silver. Money was his god. 
We know from our own experience how easy 
it is to become habituated to wrong-doing. The 
first false step is taken, perhaps, with great 
trepidation, and gives rise to bitter remorse. But 
each succeeding step becomes easier than the 
previous one. Each succeeding step makes the 
descent less abhorrent, till at last we find our- 
selves at the bottom of the hill almost before we 
are aware of it. 

The real struggle in the moral life is not 
between positive, downright, manifest virtue 
and vice — not between uncompromising justice 
and great crime. No, the real battle ground is 
the borderland between the two. How far may 
one go without ceasing to be substantially just, 
or without leaving absolutely the path of recti- 
tude? In short, it is a question of yielding or 
resisting in the so-called little things, or apparent 
trifles. ^The man who has never surrendered in 
small matters will be too deeply shocked and 
appalled by a gravely evil proposition to give it 
even a hearing. And whenever a huge theft in 
the business world, or municipal life, comes to 
our notice, we are fairly safe every time in sus- 
pecting that it is not the culprit's first or second 
offense. No doubt he has served his due period 
of apprenticeship before becoming a proficient 
in the art of embezzling, and the last big haul is 
but the culminating point, the climax to a series 
of similar acts. 



Mere: Hints: Moral, and Social. 11 

Hence the importance of guarding against 
perilous beginnings, and the grave duty incum- 
bent on parents and educators, to warn those 
under their care against the slightest dalliance 
with even the shadow of injustice. If there is 
no beginning, there can be no continuance. If 
the start be once made, it is difficult to foresee 
the end; it may prove to be a case of perpetual 
motion. As the poet puts it : 

Vice is a monster of so frightful mien, 
As to be hated needs but to be seen; 
Yet seen too oft, familiar with her face, 
We first endure, then pity, then embrace. 

The only safe course, then, is strict, absolute, 
uncompromising justice in little as in big things. 
No trifling whatsoever with the rights or belong- 
ings of our fellow-man. 



[July 7, 1909.] 

CONSCIENCE AND CASUISTRY 

LAST week we had a word to say about the 
danger of trifling in matters of justice, and 
the ease with which vicious habits are formed 
by a succession of petty acts. Casuists have 
spent much time and thought in endeavoring to 
draw the line between grave and light injustice. 
But casuistry is meant for the very weak; it was 
never intended for noble souls, and the man who 
is gifted with a keen sense of justice will not 
be foolhardy enough to see how near he can get 
to the brink of the abyss without toppling over. 



12 Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 

It is not our intention to rail at casuistry, as 
the unthinking sometimes do. Having only one 
side — and that the wrong side — presented to their 
view, they mistake the abuses and excesses for 
the thing itself and make it synonymous with 
hair-splitting and moral looseness. Casuistry is 
simply the application of general moral princi- 
ples to particular cases; and, in this true sense, 
every one of us is, and must necessarily be, some- 
thing of a casuist. But there is a true, and a 
false casuistry, and it is to the use of the false 
casuistry — the application of wrong principles, or 
the misapplication of correct principles — that 
many deplorable downfalls are due. 

Few men set out with the deliberate, cold- 
blooded intention of becoming dishonest. On the 
contrary, they try to convince themselves that 
their conduct is justifiable, and by frequent re- 
sort to excuses and palliatives, the conscience 
becomes gradually seared in these matters. The 
employee who has contracted with his employer 
for a stipulated wage, will argue that the com- 
pensation is insufficient for his work; that he 
was compelled by sheer necessity to accept terms 
which are unjust, and is consequently justified in 
taking his due surreptitiously. The clerk who 
becomes interested in the stock market, or starts 
betting on the race track, tries to persuade him- 
self that he is doing no injustice in borrowing 
his employer's money. It is purely and simply 
a loan which he fully intends to repay as soon 
as luck comes his way. If the luck fails to 
come his way, he feels himself under the pain- 



Mmt Hints: Moral and Social. 13 

ful necessity of abstracting more to recoup his 
losses, still sanguine in the hope of better times 
to come. And so he goes on, sinking deeper 
and deeper into the mire, till one fine day he 
awakens to the fact that things have come to a 
desperate pass, and that restitution is impossi- 
ble. 

The good people who resort to questionable, 
and even positively illegal, methods of money- 
getting for worthy objects of charity, bring them- 
selves to believe that, under the circumstances, 
things are permissible which in ordinary, every- 
day life they would be among the first to recog- 
nize and condemn as manifestly unlawful. In 
other words, they act on the odious principle 
that "the end justifies the means." Perhaps 
if they were openly charged with acting on this 
principle, they would indignantly resent the accu- 
sation. But it is perfectly true, nevertheless. On 
no other score or plea can they attempt to justify 
their methods. The fact that the money made 
by unlawful means is destined to be spent in a 
good cause does not alter matters one whit. The 
end, or purpose, can never make a thing good 
which is bad in itself. 

In addition, the better and the more reputa- 
ble the persons who encourage these questionable 
practices, the greater is the harm resulting. The 
great Apostle of the Gentiles, in one of his let- 
ters, warned his hearers not to let vice be even 
named among them. And his reason was that 
the very mention of vice — or conversations anent 
it — tended to familiarize people too much with 



14 Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 

the thing itself, by frequently bringing it under 
their notice. For the same reason there should 
be no simulation or connivance when there is 
question of practices that have an evil tendency. 
The child who is permitted — perhaps encour- 
aged — to take part in games of chance on a small 
scale, is not at all unlikely to develop a taste 
for gambling, which will lead him to play the 
game in real earnest, and on a larger scale, when 
occasion offers. 

Conscience is our guide in the moral life, but 
to follow it safely, we must first take every means 
in our power to set it right; we must form it on 
sound and solid principles. Concession and com- 
promise are sometimes highly commendable in 
matters of expediency, but when principle or 
justice is in the balance, nothing short of inexora- 
ble law will answer. 



[July 14, 1909-] 

EXTRA-LEGAL COMPENSATION 

EXTRA-LEGAL, or as moralists generally 
term it, occult, compensation, consists in 
acting on one's own initiative, instead of by the 
court's authority; assuming to do justice to self 
independently of a judicial sentence. It is one 
of the many instances of private self-justice, and 
may occur between husband and wife, parent 
and child, master and servant, employer and em- 
ployee, or between the citizen and the State. It 



Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 15 

has been a burning question in all ages, in both 
civil and natural law, and continues to be an 
ever-present, interesting and vital issue for law- 
yers and moralists. Though few have claimed 
that extra-legal compensation is wrong absolute- 
ly, and in every case, yet the general tendency has 
ever been to look upon it as a dangerous remedy, 
or a last resort, and consequently to hedge it 
about with so many conditions and restrictions, 
that its use is comparatively seldom permitted. 

While, then, we must admit that extra-legal 
compensation is justified at times, it will be mani- 
fest from what we have to say, that it is the ex- 
ception, and not the rule. It is so liable to abuse 
that the greatest caution and safeguards are 
needed to make it at all permissible. For public 
order, and the common weal, demand that, or- 
dinarily and regularly, in matters of litigation 
the law should be enforced, and justice executed, 
by the public authority instituted for that pur- 
pose, and it is a rare case that will permit of 
an exception. 

Besides, social order requires that in all our 
relations we should exercise good faith, sincerity 
and fidelity one toward another. Without these 
qualities there can be no such thing as con- 
fidence among men, and society cannot possibly 
hang together. Whatever, therefore, tends to 
destroy or weaken these sentiments, is clearly 
detrimental to the common good and must be 
vigorously opposed. And such would undoubted- 
ly be the case if extra-legal compensation were 
regularly sanctioned and practiced. It is easy 



16 Mere: Hints: Moral and Social. 

to understand then why the law — both natural 
and civil — has always looked askance at the 
practice. 

The last, but by no means the least im- 
portant, consideration is that we are utterly 
untrustworthy when acting as judges in our 
own cause. If all who resorted to this 
method of getting their rights, were themselves 
absolutely, or infallibly, just, fair and impartial — 
if there were no danger of over-stepping the 
bounds — the difficulty would not be so great. 
But full well we know that where self-interest 
is at stake a thoroughly disinterested judgment 
is next to impossible. Consciously or unconscious- 
ly, the natural and almost inevitable tendency is 
to favor self; to perceive in all their strength and 
fullness the arguments that will bolster up our 
own cause, and to overlook or underrate whatever 
goes to strengthen the opponent's position. So 
that the result is likely to be something more 
than justice to ourselves, and something less than 
justice to the other party. Hence the old axiom : 
"Nemo judex in sua causa." (No one is a 
proper judge in his own cause.") 

The upshot of the argument is that no one 
(unless in very exceptional instances) should un- 
dertake to exercise justice towards himself where 
there are well-ordered courts and laws to safe- 
guard individual rights. And even though the 
individual should fail now and then to secure his 
own by legal methods, it is, after all, a lesser 
evil than that society at large should suffer per- 
manently, as would most certainly happen if the 



Mere: Hints: Moral, and Social. 17 

practice of resorting to extra-legal compensation 
were universally prevalent. 



[July 21, 1909.] 

JUSTICE FAR-REACHING 

THERE are, perhaps, few virtues that need to 
be more strongly emphasized, or more fre- 
quently insisted upon, than the virtue of justice; 
and it is an unquestionable truth that if there 
were more justice in the world, there would be 
far less need for charity. For justice demands 
that we respect the rights of others and give to 
every man his due; and most assuredly, if this 
great principle characterized all our dealings with 
our fellow-men, if respect for the rights and prop- 
erty of the neighbor were universal, there would 
be comparatively little occasion to call on others 
for assistance. 

From its very nature we can readily see how 
comprehensive the virtue of justice is. It enters 
into all our human relations — in the political and 
business world, in the family and in social life, 
and the ways of offending against it are various 
and manifold. Calumny and backbiting are con- 
trary to justice, because they infringe on the in- 
jured man's right to his good name or reputation. 
Murder and assault are opposed to justice, be- 
cause they violate the victim's right to bodily life 
and health. But the phase of the question that 



18 Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 

most directly and immediately concerns us now, 
is a due regard for the property rights of our 
fellow-man. 

There are, of course, very many cases in which 
the distinction between justice and injustice is 
clear-cut or well defined — where the boundary 
line between honesty and dishonesty is so well 
marked as to leave no possible room for doubt 
or question. But there are also numberless in- 
stances in which the injustice is not so manifest — 
at least, for those whose conscience is not over- 
delicate in these matters, and who are constantly 
on the lookout for loopholes of escape from the 
obligations of justice. And it is precisely for 
such cases and such persons, that moralists lay 
down the rule that he who takes or uses the 
property of another, againt the owner's reason- 
able will, is guilty of injustice. It matters not 
what name the culprit may give to his act, or 
what his motives may have been, it is none the 
less a crime, and the doer deserves to be branded 
with the mark of injustice. 

The man who deliberately fails to live up 
to the terms of his contract by supplying an in- 
ferior class of goods; the merchant who misrep- 
resents the value of his wares, or sells them for 
more than their worth ; the grocer who uses false 
weights and measures ; the servant who disposes 
of the master's goods without leave, even in 
charity; the conscious plagiarist, and all who ap- 
propriate to themselves for purposes of gain the 
products of another's brainwork, whether in art, 
literature or the industrial world — all of these 



Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 19 

are (there is no need to mince words in the mat- 
ter) simply thieving, and because of their greater 
knowledge, merit far more punishment than the 
poor tramp or outcast who takes barely enough 
to keep body and soul together. The hired man 
who wastes or fritters away the time that be- 
longs to his employer is just as guilty as if he 
stole the value of his time in cash. Equally 
guilty is the man who, having the use of another's 
goods, deliberately abuses them ; the tenant or 
leaseholder who, through culpable neglect, allows 
a property to go to wreck and ruin, and the bor- 
rower who abuses the confidence reposed in him. 

However, anent the relations of employer and 
employee, it is but just to add that there are two 
sides, or two parties, to a contract. It is a poor 
rule that won't work both ways ; and if the labor- 
ing man has duties, he has his rights also. If the 
man who sells his time is bound to give it to his 
employer, the latter in turn is bound to give him 
a just recompense — a living wage — and should he 
take a mean advantage of a poor man's necessity, 
in accordance with sweatshop methods, he is 
worse than the common thief. Defrauding labor- 
ers of their just dues is mentioned in Holy 
Writ as one of the sins that cry to Heaven for 
vengeance : "Behold, the hire of the laborers 
who have reaped down your field, which by fraud 
has been kept back by you, crieth, and the cry 
of them hath entered into the ears of the Lord 
of Sabaoth." (James, v, 4.) 

Some of the things mentioned in this paper 
are not treated as thefts in civil law ; at least, they 



20 Mere: Hints: Moral and Social. 

are not punished by fine or imprisonment. But 
they are none the less thefts in the sight of the 
Almighty, and the genuinely just man will be 
guided in these matters, not by fear of legal 
punishment, but rather by the dictates of the 
moral law. 



[July 28, 1909-] 

BINDING FORCE OF TAXATION 
LAWS 

THE number of those whose conscience is 
awry in matters of civil law generally, and 
taxation laws in particular, is by no means small. 
Should any of our readers doubt the truth of this 
statement, let them question the men whose duty 
it is to administer such laws, and in all likelihood 
they will be satisfied that we are not exag- 
gerating. Many of those to whom we refer are 
persons of admitted probity and honesty in their 
private dealings— people who would not for 
worlds do a deliberate act of injustice to their 
fellow-men; who are scrupulously exact in the 
payment of their recognized just debts, and even 
delicate in their regard for the property rights of 
others. And yet they never for an instant sus- 
' pect themselves of wrong-doing in evading just 
taxation laws on every possible occasion. Such 
persons evidently look upon civil law not as bind- 
ing in conscience, but as purely penal enactments. 
There is no other plausible means of justifying 
their attempts to escape their pro-rata assess- 
ments. 



Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 21 

It is easy enough to show that this opinion 
is very far from the truth. Of course, no one 
denies that there are such things as purely penal 
laws ; that is to say, laws whose violation entails 
no real moral evil, but only the obligation of pay- 
ing the fine imposed in these cases. But assured- 
ly all laws — or better, most laws — are not of this 
description. The public authority has the right 
to make just laws binding in conscience, and in 
most cases it means to use that right. For the 
Christian there can be no doubt or question at all 
about this, since the Founder of Christianity 
has expressly commanded His followers to "ren- 
der to Caesar the things that are Caesar's." And 
for the benefit of those who have not the Scrip- 
tures at hand, it may not be amiss to quote the 
words of the great Doctor of the Gentiles on this 
subject. Nothing could be more explicit than 
his utterance, which is an excellent specimen, not 
only of divine, but of human wisdom as well: 
"Wherefore be subject of necessity," he urges, 
"not only for wrath [or through fear], but for 
conscience' sake. For therefore also you pay 
tribute. For they are the ministers of God, serv- 
ing unto this purpose. Render, therefore, to all 
men their dues. Tribute to whom tribute is due ; 
custom [or tax] to whom custom;" etc. 

Common-sense itself urges the same duty. It 
stands to reason that the members of the body 
social should be willing to pay for the benefits 
which they receive from it, and that in propor- 
tion to their means. All moralists are agreed 
that legitimate taxation laws bind, not merely 



22 Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 

out of respect or obedience, but in strict justice. 
In fact, a compliance with these laws is simply 
the payment of a just debt for value received. 
The heads of the community incur the public 
debt for the benefit of the people, and as their rep- 
resentatives, and if some shirk their duty in the 
matter of reimbursement, others must necessarily 
be overburdened to make up for the deficit. 

It is, of course, inevitable that doubts should 
sometimes arise as to the justice or legitimacy 
of a tax, and if there be a thoroughly reasonable, 
or well-founded, doubt concerning the compe- 
tency or right of the authorities to impose them, 
they cannot be said to bind in justice. But when 
the doubt concerns the necessity, the utility, or 
the expediency of the tax, or the just ratio or pro- 
portion of individual assessments, the presump- 
tion is in favor of the authorities ; to them should 
be given the benefit of the doubt. For, standing 
aloft, as they are, on the watch-tower and seeing 
needs which escape our notice, they are in a bet- 
ter position to judge of these things than the 
average citizen who is not directly concerned with 
the administration of public affairs. It is easy 
enough to pick flaws, and find matter for criticism, 
in the acts of our public guardians and law- 
makers, but if we would be just in our estimate 
of them, we must put ourselves in their place, 
and look at things from their standpoint. In 
short, fairness and squareness demand that in 
dealing with the men to whom we have intrusted 
the care of the commonwealth, we give due 
weight to both sides of the question, and adopt 



Mere: Hints: Moral and Social. 23 

toward them a mental and practical attitude 
that will prove a help, rather than a hindrance, 
to their efforts. 

In this matter of taxation one thing at least 
is certain — and it is the principal point we wish 
to make — to wit : that those who avail themselves 
of the advantages which the State and municipal 
governments afford, ought in fair play and justice 
to make a reasonable return, and a refusal to 
contribute one's just quota, thereby throwing an 
extra burden on the rest of the community, is 
equivalent to indirect robbery. 



[August 4, 1909.] 

BIG AND LITTLE MALEFACTORS 

THERE is not the slightest doubt that public 
opinion — what the Germans call the Zeit- 
geist or time spirit — has very much to do with 
the frequency or rarity of crime. It forms a sort 
of moral atmosphere which all must breathe. Its 
germs of good or evil are taken in or rejected 
according to our moral make-up. But, try as we 
may, it is difficult to free ourselves wholly from 
its influence. Hence the necessity of doing every- 
thing in our power to contribute to the forma- 
tion of a right public conscience. 

By public opinion we mean not only the spoken 
or printed word, but our general attitude, or 
manner of acting, as well; and this practical ex- 
pression of opinion is stronger and more influen- 
tial than speech. To illustrate: We have but 



24 Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 

to notice the too common methods of dealing 
with criminals. Needless to say, all the crimi- 
nals are not in the lockup; and we may very 
truthfully add, that the biggest and worst are 
still at large, and that this is due, in great meas- 
ure, to the practical attitude of our public officials, 
and of the public generally, in dealing with these 
men. 

Only a few weeks ago (July 12) a news item 
appeared in The Sun stating that a man — a cer- 
tain Whitaker — had been sentenced in the Crimi- 
nal Court of Suffolk, Va., to two years' imprison- 
ment for stealing an orange, notwithstanding the 
man's plea that he was forced by hunger to take 
the fruit, having eaten nothing for two days. 
Not so very long since there was a similar case 
of a long-term sentence imposed for the theft 
of a ham (we don't remember the exact length 
of the sentence, not having the clipping at hand). 
When asked if he had anything to say in his de- 
fense, the prisoner replied: "Nothing, except 
to thank God that I didn't take the whole pig." 
As our readers are fully aware, these are pretty 
fair samples of the manner of meting out justice 
to the low-down criminal who has neither money 
nor friends. As a rule, the petty thief gets jus- 
tice with a vengeance. 

On the contrary, it is a notorious fact that 
the colossal rogues — those who steal on a large 
scale — frequently go unpunished, or with a nomi- 
nal punishment utterly out of proportion to their 
crime. In fact, the bigger the theft, the more 
likely they are to get immunity. There are, it 



Mere: Hints: Moral and Social,. 25 

is true, notable and most praiseworthy excep- 
tions; but it is almost the rule to show greater 
leniency toward the big sharks — the men who 
steal from the Government, or from the commu- 
nity at large, by the thousands or the millions. 
We all know how difficult it is to secure the con- 
viction of men of wealth, influence or political 
prominence. 

Nor is it only in the tribunals of justice that 
we find these conditions. The same state exists 
practically in society. In words, we are loud 
enough in our condemnation of the big male- 
factors. But is it not an unquestionable fact that 
many of these men, in spite of the clearest proofs 
against them, are received by society without 
shame, with open arms — aye, and even lionized 
by it? People who would scorn to associate 
with the common or petty thief — with the man 
who stole a loaf of bread — are proud to be num- 
bered among the friends or acquaintances of the 
clever landgrabber, the railroad or corporation 
robber. 

In stating these facts, which are patent to 
every observant reader, there is no intention 
whatsoever of condoning or minimizing crime, 
however small its proportions. Far from it. 
Crime is crime everywhere and at all times. And 
that is precisely the point we wish to make — 
that all crime should be punished, and that jus- 
tice should be meted out in proportion to the 
crime — the greater the wrong done, the greater 
the penalty. There is no socialism or class dis- 
crimination in this. There is nothing new in it 



26 Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 

either. It is merely a statement of an eternal 
truth. And when we hold that the colossal rob- 
bers — no matter how high their social standing — 
deserve greater contempt and severer punish- 
ment than the common thief, we are but apply- 
ing to present conditions a principle as old as 
the hills themselves. 



[August ii, 1909.] 



SOME IMPORTANT FACTORS IN THE 
FORMATION OF PUBLIC OPINION 

LAST Wednesday in an editorial entitled "Big 
and Little Malefactors," it was said that 
public opinion is sometimes largely responsible 
for the prevalence of crime. Special reference 
was made to the fact that, in spite of our much 
vaunted claim of equal justice to all, there is fre- 
quently a discrimination between the influential 
and the friendless criminal, to the very great 
disadvantage of the latter. Perhaps if we in- 
quired into the source of this greater indulgence 
toward the big culprits, we should find it in their 
greater cleverness and daring. These are quali- 
ties that can scarcely fail to arouse our admira- 
tion, even in the moral pervert who abuses them. 
And as long as we permit this feeling to influence 
our attitude toward them, just so long will they 
continue to take a mean advantage of it, and 
fill their coffers at the public expense, trusting 
to get off with a light sentence, or even without 
any punishment at all. 



Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 27 

However, it is not only in matters of justice, 
that public opinion plays so prominent a part, 
but in all other moral matters likewise. And 
since such is the case, it may not be useless to 
recall a few of the chief factors that go to make 
up public opinion, or the public conscience. First 
and foremost among these factors is the press, 
which, on account of its extensive or far-reach- 
ing influence, is to-day one of the greatest of the 
forces that make for good or evil, for weal or 
woe. Everybody reads the papers, and every 
one is more or less influenced by what he reads. 
This is true, to a certain extent, even of the 
strong, and still more true of the weak and un- 
discriminating. It has been truly said that : "evil 
associations corrupt good morals," and "Show 
me a man's heroes, or ideals, and I'll tell you 
what he is." The average man's favorite news- 
paper is to him a boon companion. It is his 
general informant, his "guide, philosopher and 
friend." When, therefore, a portion of the press, 
represented by the sensational, scandal-monger- 
ing yellow journals, either openly preaches, or 
covertly insinuates, vice or anything akin to it, 
the effects may be easily foreseen. It requires 
very little discernment, then, to realize the vital 
importance of allowing in the household none 
but morally clean and healthy newspapers, and 
tabooing absolutely those that cater to the tastes 
of the morbid and depraved. 

While on the subject of the press, it may not 
be amiss to mention that what we have said of 
newspapers, applies with equal force to literature 



28 Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 

generally, and more especially to novels. Verily, 
it is lamentable to find in the hands of youths, 
and, worse still, of maidens — the mothers and 
moral trainers of the coming generation — stuff 
so obscene that, if put in letter form, and sent 
through the United States mails, it would make 
the sender liable to fine or imprisonment ! When 
we find the parents of the future nourishing their 
minds with such unmitigated filth, what can we 
expect from the children who are so unfortunate 
as to spring from them? 

In line with the yellow journal and filthy, 
degrading novel is the low, immoral theatre, or 
what amounts to the same — and is even worse — 
the self-styled high-class theatre trading in low, 
immoral shows. It is truly a pitiable condition 
of affairs when our modern histrionic performers 
are permitted to enact on the theatrical stage, 
and before a cultured audience, scenes whose 
reproduction in our public parks would entitle 
the actors and actresses to a ride in the patrol 
wagon. 

Such are a few of the forces that go to make 
up public opinion. Properly directed they can 
accomplish a vast amount of good; misdirected, 
they are sources of untold evil. It may be ob- 
jected that they are effects, rather than causes ; 
that they are governed by the law of supply and 
demand; in a word, that these things must be 
furnished because the public demands them. But 
economists will tell you that the supply often 
creates the demand. Hence it is our bounden 
duty, both as individuals and as members of 



Mere; Hints: Moral and Social. 29 

society, to do all that lies in our power to de- 
stroy these evil influences, or at least to restrain 
them within the very narrowest possible limits. 



[August 18, 1909.] 

HERO-WORSHIP 

HERO-WORSHIP is inborn in man. It be- 
gan with the beginning of the human race, 
and will end only with its finish. As Carlyle 
once put it: "It is the joy of man's heart to 
admire where he can; nothing so lifts him from 
all his mean imprisonments, were it only for 
moments, as true admiration." Nor is it only 
the great and good who admire what is really 
admirable. Even the vicious respect in others 
the fine qualities which they themselves lack. 
In fact, hypocrisy itself is but the tribute which 
vice pays to virtue. Deprived of the genuine 
article, the hypocrite takes unto himself the 
counterfeit; assuming or aping the noble traits 
which command the respect of thinking men. 

Since the world has ever had, and ever will 
have, its heroes or ideals, clearly it is of prime 
importance that it have none but the very best 
placed before it. Truly worthy heroes and ideals 
are among the world's most prolific sources of 
great deeds. It goes without saying that the 
example of generals like Napoleon and our own 
Washington served, as well as any other one 
cause, to spur on their men to feats of valor when 



30 Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 

the army's courage was on the point of failing. 
And, not to enter into too many details, the same 
holds true in every other walk or department of 
life. It is the pace set by the leaders, the ex- 
emplars — in a word, by the heroes — that urges 
on their admirers to attempt the performance of 
worthy, if not of positively great, deeds. They 
may not be able — in most cases, they will not 
be able — to attain to the ideal; to rival the 
achievements of their idols. But at all events, 
it is well to aim high. Like the prudent marks- 
man, we must make a little allowance for the 
law of gravity, and the consequent drop in dis- 
tance. If the hero-worshiper cannot equal the 
brilliant acts of his hero, at least he can follow 
him at a respectful distance ; and even so much 
is a great gain both for himself personally and 
for society at large. 

Hero-worship, then, is a good thing for the 
world. There is no doubt about it. But in 
order that it may accomplish all that it is cal- 
culated to effect, none but the right sort of 
heroes should be proposed for admiration and 
imitation. No wooden gods should be placed in 
our shrines; no idols with feet of clay should 
be placed on our pedestals. None but those of 
golden deeds should be enthroned for the admir- 
ing gaze of the onlookers. 

This does not mean, however, that our heroes 
should be only those whose public acts were 
great and glittering in the sight of the world. It 
is all well and good to keep before the eyes of the 
people the lives and achievements of a Washing- 



Mere: Hints: Moral and Social. 31 

ton, a Lincoln, and others of their stamp. Men 
like these were real heroes and deserve all the 
honor they get. But, after all, there are far 
greater heroes whose names form no part of 
history; who were never known— many of them 
— outside their own little circle. And it would 
be a truly good thing for the youth of the rising 
generation if their parents and teachers were to 
impress this fact deeply on their minds. The 
best heroes are the people who are doing a real 
service to humanity, whether their sphere of 
action be wide or limited. Some of the great 
warriors whom history extols most highly were 
anything but benefactors of the race. Their 
dominant motive through life was human glory 
or self-aggrandizement; and it is scarcely just 
and proper to hold them up as models for the 
young. The unselfish nurse who devotes her 
days and nights, on the battle field or in the 
hospital, to the relief of suffering humanity; the 
poor overworked mother who sacrifices her pleas- 
ure and her health for the sake of her offspring, 
the laborer who toils and moils for the support 
of his family, in sickness as in health, and in 
spite of the difficulties that beset his uphill path 
— all these and many more are doing things per- 
haps more truly heroic than the deeds of some 
whom the world acclaims as its greatest heroes. 
And these are the characters that should be 
held up for the admiration and imitation of the 
rank and file of our children. In spite of the 
fond wishes of doting parents and guardians, 
every American child cannot become the Presi- 



32 Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 

dent of the United States, every American child 
cannot become a Lee or a Stonewall Jackson; 
but every American child can become, with 
proper training and proper ideals, a conscientious 
performer of duty in whatever station of life 
his lot has been cast. 



[September i, 1909.] 

THE SPIRIT OF DISCONTENT 

IT HAS been said that "discontent is the origin 
of progress," and in one sense the saying is 
perfectly true. Nations and individuals that are 
fully satisfied with present conditions are not 
very likely to bestir themselves and push on to 
higher things. They are more apt to stagnate. 
History shows this clearly enough. Take, for 
instance, the Chinese. Long centuries ago, when 
our barbarian ancestors were roaming through 
the forest primeval, the almond-eyed Orientals 
were among the first and foremost peoples of the 
civilized world, and had made long strides for- 
ward in the arts and sciences. But having once 
reached a certain stage of development, their 
pride and self-conceit led them to consider them- 
selves as near perfection as need be, with the re- 
sult that they have been practically at a stand- 
still ever since — at least, until recently. If we 
except the Japanese, the same holds true of near- 
ly every other Asiatic people. Again, if Euro- 
peans and Americans had been content with 



Mere Hints: Morae and Sociae. 33 

the ancient and mediaeval modes of locomotion, 
we would never have had our steamboats and 
railroads, our electric railways and, a fortiori, 
the modern means of aerial navigation. 

Discontent, then, understood in this sense, 
is something highly commendable. It is noth- 
ing more or less than the desire to bring out the 
best that is in us. It is a wish to better condi- 
tions, to improve the world, and bring it as near 
as possible to perfection. There is nothing 
chimerical or Utopian about it; it is self-re- 
strained, reasonable, and kept within due bounds. 
It aims only at the realizable. It is a source 
of emulation and praiseworthy rivalry, spurring 
men on to surpass one another in conferring 
benefits on mankind at large. It is not only use- 
ful, but likewise essential, for the evolution of 
the race. 

There is another sense, however, in which 
discontent is not the origin of progress, but 
the very reverse — a sense in which it is not at 
all laudable, but, on the contrary, one of the 
worst curses that can light on individuals or 
nations. We mean here the discontent of sulki- 
ness — the discontent of despair — the state of 
those who are disgruntled and, at the same time, 
hopeless ; who are ever thinking of, and aspiring 
to, the unattainable. This is the discontent of 
pessimism, as the former is the discontent of 
optimism. To make our meaning clearer and 
plainer, if need be, it is not at all uncommon to 
find chronic grumblers who are dissatisfied with 
the gifts God has given them, and the station of 



34 Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 

life for which they are by nature fitted. They 
want to be what they can never be, and being 
unable to reach the goal of their desires, decide 
to sit down idly, with folded arms, and do noth- 
ing. They must be either leaders or nobodies — 
as if an army composed entirely of generals, or 
a navy, of admirals, would be of any earthly 
use to a nation. 

Such an attitude is the bitter enemy of all 
human progress, and the foster-parent of stagna- 
tion. Those who are so afflicted, evidently lose 
sight of the fact that society, like the individual, 
is a living organism, composed of many and 
varied members, and that its essential well-being 
depends on the harmonious working or co- 
operation of its different parts. All can't be 
the head, or the eye, or the ear. Some must 
of necessity fill the minor parts ; and these minor 
parts are just as important in their way as the 
more conspicuous offices. And just as in the 
human body we value all the members, so in 
society at large, absolutely speaking, there is 
no vocation mean or ignoble. Shakespeare tells 
us that "the world's a stage and all the men 
and women players thereon." That is true 
enough. But there is one great, striking dif- 
ference between the theatrical stage and the 
great drama of human life. On the former, 
as a rule, the leading lights — the star actors and 
actresses — get most of the applause; those who 
are forced to play the lesser roles often get but 
scant notice. But on the great, wide stage where 
the Author of our being is both judge and au- 



Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 35 

dience, it matters not what part we play — 
whether it be prominent or obscure — provided 
we play it well. The hodcarrier and the poor 
washerwoman, who perform conscientiously and 
exactly the duties of their lowly state, may be 
far more pleasing to their Maker than the pro- 
fessional man, the monarch, or the genius — 
certainly, a consoling reflection. 

Besides, in this world nothing succeeds like 
success. For most men it means everything; 
while the Creator regards not the amount of 
success we obtain, but the efforts we put forth — 
our earnestness, our sincerity and good will. To 
do cheerfully and well — to the very best of our 
ability— the duties of the position in life for 
which the God of Nature has fitted us, this is 
the real test, the true and only solid gauge of 
genuine human worth. 



[September 8, 1909.] 

THE DUTY OF REPARATION 

WHEN one has injured another, either in- 
tentionally or by culpable negligence, he 
is bound in conscience to repair the damage, as 
far as he is able. Regrets and apologies are 
not sufficient: he must actually make good the 
loss. Neither will the punishment meted out 
by public authority answer the purpose. It will 
indeed atone, in a measure, for the violation of 



36 Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 

law, it may serve as a future preventive for the 
guilty party, and an efficacious lesson or warn- 
ing for others, and in this way prove a real bene- 
fit to the community. But, after all, there is not 
much satisfaction in this for the injured party. 
What he wishes, and what he is entitled to, is 
the recovery of his own. 

Whosoever, therefore, has stolen the property 
of another must, if he would salve his conscience, 
and square himself with justice, return it, or its 
equivalent, to the owner. If the owner cannot 
be found, it must be handed over to his heirs. 
When it is impossible to locate either, even then 
the unjust possessor has no right to it and may 
not hold it. He has not come by it honestly, 
and must devote it to charitable or philanthropic 
objects. This feature of the case is clear enough, 
and generally well understood. As a rule, those 
who are guilty of downright injustice, if they 
have a conscience at all, realize that without 
restitution there is no possibility of pardon. 

But there is another phase of the subject 
which is not so thoroughly understood, and 
that is the necessity of making restitution in 
cases of what the moralists style "damnifica- 
tion." It is for this reason that, in beginning 
the article, we used the words: "Either inten- 
tionally or by culpable negligence." Where 
there has been a deliberate destruction of prop- 
erty, of course there can be no question of the ob- 
ligation. But the part that is not so clear to some, 
is the case in which the damage was not inflicted 
wilfully, but resulted from gross negligence or 



Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 37 

carelessness. Yet it is very difficult to see why 
there should be any doubt about this. Justice — 
a regard for the rights of others — requires that 
we exercise a reasonable amount of prudence, 
care or caution, in order to prevent harm from 
accruing to our fellow-men through persons for 
whom, or things for which, we are responsible. 
If we knowingly neglect this, and thereby indi- 
rectly cause a loss to another, it stands to rea- 
son that we are bound to make good the loss, 
which would not have occurred if we had done 
what justice and common sense demanded. 

If I borrow an object of value at all, there 
is a tacit agreement — an unwritten and unspoken 
contract — between the lender and myself, that the 
thing should be returned unimpaired — in the con- 
dition in which it was when I took it. Should 
I ruin it by my deliberate carelessness, certain- 
ly I am bound, not only in honor, but likewise 
in justice, to pay for it. When I rent or lease 
a property, it is understood that I take reason- 
ably good care of it, and have a proper regard 
for the owner's interests, or at the very least, 
that I do nothing positively detrimental to his 
interests. If by conscious and gross negligence 
I damaged that property, clearly I ought to re- 
pair the damage. Again, every property holder is 
bound in justice to keep his holdings in such 
a condition that they will not be a menace to 
the lives or the health of his fellow-men. And 
if, through his parsimony or indifference, he al- 
lows his property to become the direct cause 
of accidents or' ill health, undoubtedly he is 



38 Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 

bound, in strict justice, to repair the damage. 

Man, however, possesses other goods besides 
money or money's worth — goods which cannot 
be bought with money, and which, if hje has a 
lively sense of honor, he prizes above all material 
things. Chief among these is his good name — 
a possession dearer than life itself. As the im- 
mortal Bard of Avon puts it : "Who steals my 
purse steals trash; but he that filches from me 
my good name, robs me of that which not enriches 
him, and makes me poor indeed." And if the 
man who steals my purse is obliged to make 
restitution, with much more reason is the de- 
famer bound to restore to me my reputation, even 
if, to accomplish that object, he must go to the 
length of admitting himself a liar. If those who 
make a practice of injuring their fellows would 
consider seriously this duty of reparation, per- 
haps it would make them much more careful, and 
so avert a vast deal of human misery. For, after 
all, the injury done to others, whether in their 
fortune or good name, is very much in the nature 
of an illegal loan which must be paid back some 
day or other with compound interest. 



[September 15, 1909.] 

IS THE CORPORATION AN 
IRRESPONSIBLE AGENT? 

IT IS well-nigh incomprehensible how some 
men who, as individuals and in private life, 
are scrupulously honest, seem to consider them- 
selves untrammeled by the common, ordinary 



Mere: Hints: Moral and Social,. 39 

laws of honesty, when acting as members of a 
syndicate or corporation. In their private ca- 
pacity they are thoroughly and heartily ashamed 
to do things which, as monopolists or trust offi- 
cials, give them not the slightest concern. By 
what rule of morals they are enabled to arrive 
at such a pass, we know not. We have not the 
faintest conception of any principle that would 
justify their attitude — this Jekyll and Hyde mode 
of acting. Apart from their corporate connec- 
tions, they are absolutely reliable and trust- 
worthy. They will pay their just debts, even to 
the very last farthing. They would scorn to re- 
sort to underhand methods for the purpose of cir- 
cumventing their brother in business. Many of 
them are eminently respectable, prominent in 
church and charitable work, and seem to have 
no reason for conscientious scruples regarding 
their conduct. But the moment they appear as 
representatives of the trust or monopoly, they 
seem to be totally different men. They throw 
off the Dr. Jekyll side of their character, and be- 
come veritable Hydes. The Almighty, no doubt, 
gave them a heart, and perhaps in private life 
they show it, but in their business relations they 
are often utterly heartless, unsympathetic, and 
even cruel. They will not hesitate to drive their 
poor competitors to the wall; to deprive others 
of their means of livelihood ; to underpay and 
tyrannize over their employees, and to grind the 
last cent out of the widow and the orphan. 

What is the reason of this seemingly dual 
nature? of this striking contrast between the two 



40 Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 

sides — the private and the business sides — of one 
and the same man? Is it because he feels that, 
in business life, his identity or personality is 
lost — merged in the corporation or trust? Or 
can it be that he considers the trust a soulless 
thing, and consequently without moral responsi- 
bility? To the latter supposition we may answer 
^and it must be confessed that the answer seems 
ridiculously superfluous — that the trust or corT 
poration is made up of individuals who have a 
soul, and are supposed to have a conscience ; and 
as the whole is nothing more than the aggregate 
of the parts that compose it, it follows that the 
trust or corporation is not a something without 
soul or responsibility, but on the contrary a thor- 
oughly responsible moral agent. 

Therefore, when a body of men band together 
and enter into a conspiracy to defraud, or over- 
reach, their fellow-men, each and every member 
of the band is guilty of rank injustice. The 
actual thief is not always the most guilty party. 
There are other ways of sinning against our fel- 
low-man's property rights besides the actual com- 
mission of theft, and some of these ways make 
the accessory more guilty than the principal — 
or, to be more exact, make the seeming accessory 
the real principal. The man who forces those 
under his control or influence to perpetrate a 
wrong, is clearly worse than the actual wrong- 
doer, who is only his tool or instrument. In 
fact, every species of conscious and deliberate co- 
operation in evil involves a moral guilt varying 
in degree, according to the closeness and efficacy 



Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 41 

of the co-operation. As instances, we may men- 
tion the giving of advice or counsel by which 
one is induced to commit a crime which he 
would not have perpetrated if left to himself; 
the criminal consent, whether expressed or im- 
plied, of those whose influence over others counts 
for much; the reception of stolen goods; the 
concealment of grave crime when its actual or 
threatened exposure would have the effect of 
deterring the evil-doer, and gross neglect of duty 
on the part of those who are bound by their 
office to prevent injustice and safeguard the com- 
munity. 

Besides these general modes of indirect 
thievery, there are some others peculiar to the 
industrial or business world. A well-known ex- 
ample is that of monopolizing or "cornering" an 
article for the purpose of fixing prices to suit the 
holder — a most reprehensible practice, thorough- 
ly unlawful and unjust, because it is contrary to 
the natural, economic law of supply and demand. 
The same holds true of all combinations in re- 
straint of trade; the system of rebates, and the 
various other ways and means adopted to kill 
competition — for the benefit of the trusts, and to 
the great detriment of the consumer. 

It will not do to hide behind the pretext that 
these things are the acts of no single individual, 
but of a body. Each and every individual who 
has an active voice or vote in the proceedings 
is responsible for the wrong to which he con- 
sents, and is bound both in honor and conscience 
to make amends for the injury he has inflicted. 



42 Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 

[September 22, 1909.] 

THE MILK OF HUMAN KINDNESS 

SOME things there are that cost nothing in 
money and yet are among the world's 
greatest assets. In truth, they are not purchas- 
able with money, and are above all money value ; 
nevertheless, they may be possessed and dis- 
pensed as lavishly by the poorest of the poor 
as by the richest Croesus on earth. Chief among 
these is human kindness or sympathy. It is 
something that mankind can ill dispense with. 
The strong need it as well as the weak. Those 
who are able to begin or finish great enterprises 
without its aid are few and far between. And 
the rare few who can get along without it are 
monstrosities. They are not such people as we 
would care to associate with. If they don't de- 
sire our sympathy, it is not very likely that they 
will have overmuch regard for ourselves. In 
truth, without this craving for sympathy the 
world would be loveless, and consequently unfit 
for habitation. 

A very large proportion of the troubles, vexa- 
tions, and disappointments of married life comes 
precisely from the lack of sympathy with each 
other's work, aims and aspirations. Did we not 
deem it unfair to the dead, we could mention 
instances in point from' the lives of personages 
celebrated in history — particularly among char- 
acters of a literary bent. And the same applies 
with equal force to the average man and woman. 



Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 43 

Among the grounds for divorce, we frequently 
hear mentioned "incompatibility of temper," and 
this same "incompatibility of temper" is, in not 
a few cases, neither more nor less than the lack 
of sympathy between man and wife. 

There are persons to whom this sentiment is 
quite natural; with others it must be cultivated. 
But it is well worth cultivating — for the sake 
of the good it is able to accomplish. How many 
a poor devil has gone to the bottom of the steep 
incline, and plunged into the burning abyss, for 
the want of a kind, sympathetic word spoken 
in the nick of time ! And, on the other hand, how 
many a one has been saved from wreck and ruin 
by a helping hand extended just at the crucial 
moment ! 

There are plenty of people in the world — and 
people of spirit, too — who have gone to the bad 
because of improper methods of dealing with 
them, perhaps, in youth. There are plenty who 
can be led but not driven. And a little kindness 
or sympathy will often accomplish what a vast 
amount of barking is unable to effect. The great 
Apostle St. Paul thoroughly understood and 
acted upon this plan, for he tells us that "he 
made himself all things to all men that he might 
gain all to Christ." He was weak with the weak, 
and strong with the strong. He rejoiced with 
the glad and wept with the sorrowful. And this 
is the safe and sane policy that should be adopted 
by all who would reclaim the erring. 

Of course, like all other good things, sym- 
pathy is liable to abuse. Weak and utterly de- 



44 Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 

pendent people have an abnormal craving for it, 
and the more they get, the more they want, and 
the more they get, the weaker and more dependent 
they become. For moral development, just as for 
physical growth, exercise is needed. In other 
words, strength of character cannot be acquired 
without opposition or resistance. Hence it is the 
invariable policy of all judicious charity workers 
to enable the needy to help themselves, instead of 
supporting them continuously, and thereby run- 
ning a risk of converting them into parasites. 
Give them a chance; set them on their feet, but 
let them do the walking themselves. On the 
habitually shiftless and improvident, sympathy 
is wasted. Another grave danger for the sym- 
pathy seeker is the craving for popularity, which 
is not infrequently destructive of truthful and 
honest manhood. It is extremely difficult for the 
popularity hunter to be true to himself and his 
convictions. The desire of pleasing, and the fear 
of offending, are certainly not conducive to hon- 
esty and straightforwardness in expressing one's 
opinion. Quite the contrary. The man who has 
an abnormal thirst for popular applause is apt to 
say what will best please his hearers, regardless 
of its truth or falsehood. Not, of course, that all 
who seek sympathy are in this class of popularity 
hunters. The case is rather an extreme one. 

However, the fact that a thing is liable to 
abuse, should not deter us from using it. But 
while we cannot get on in life without sympathy, 
we should make it our earnest endeavor to do 
with the smallest possible amount of it, giving it 



Mere; Hints: Moral and Social. 45 

unstintingly to others, however, when occasion 
demands. This is one of the instances in which 
it is more blessed to give than to receive. The 
giving or withholding of a kind, sympathetic 
word may not cost us much, perhaps not even 
an effort, but it may mean a lifetime of happiness 
or a lifetime of misery for the party in need. 



[September 29, 1909.] 

THE USES OF PAIN 

RELATIVE to the large number of suicides 
reported by the daily press, it is fairly safe 
to say that, in almost every case, self-destruction 
is due to temporary insanity — to a craze resulting 
from intolerable grief or shame. It is difficult to 
imagine anyone in his sane and sober senses de- 
liberately making away with himself. And as- 
suredly there is no bravery in the act. It is not 
a mark of fortitude, but rather of extreme weak- 
ness ; of the unwillingness or inability to suffer. 
As an old poet once put it : "He is not brave 
that dares to die, but he that boldly bears calam- 
ity." Or, as another has it: "When all the 
blandishments of life are gone, the coward sneaks 
to death; the brave live on." Many there are 
whose life is a heavy burden, and to whom death 
would be a most welcome relief; but they refuse 
to take this means of getting rid of their troubles, 
because they realize that the Author of life has 
placed them here, like sentinels at their posts, and 



46 Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 

wishes them to remain until He sees fit to call 
them. Which is the more heroic or manly course 
— to shuffle off this mortal coil in order to escape 
life's cares and sorrows, or to march on, day after 
day, through the Valley of Shadows, cheerfully 
or at least resignedly, in the face and teeth of 
adversity ? 

A little intelligent reflection on the uses of 
pain might prove an incalculable help to such as 
are driven to the verge of desperation, and nigh 
unto the madness that ends in self-destruction. 
True enough, the existence of physical and moral 
evil has been a grave and vexing problem since 
men first began to think. The believer finds in it 
numerous and weighty difficulties which he can 
never hope to solve, while the atheist adduces 
it as an argument against the belief in a just or 
merciful God. However, even though we cannot 
penetrate into the depths of the mystery of pain, 
there is enough on the surface to show us that it 
has its advantages. In the first place, it makes 
us more humane and sympathetic. Who are the 
persons best fitted to sympathize with the afflict- 
ed? Certainly not those who have never known 
the pangs of suffering, but rather they who have 
themselves passed through the fiery crucible and 
know full well what it means. They alone can 
truly say, with the ancient Pagan poet: "I my- 
self am human, hence nothing that concerns hu- 
manity is a matter of indifference to me." 

Again, suffering lessens the bitterness of the 
final parting. If life, with all its pains and griefs, 
is yet so sweet, how much more difficult would 



Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 47 

it be to leave it, if there were nothing at all to 
suffer ! Besides, suffering is an indispensable fac- 
tor in character building. It is to man's moral 
development what food and exercise are to his 
physical growth ; and no man or woman who has 
not experienced pain, can really be said to have 
arrived at maturity. They can best enjoy, who 
know best how to suffer. In fact, our capacity 
for enjoyment is in proportion to our capacity 
for suffering. Were there never a rift in the lute, 
or a cloud in the sky, the pleasures of life would 
lose half their charm. They would become mon- 
otonous and pall on us, for : "The rays of happi- 
ness, like those of light, are colorless when un- 
broken." We never appreciate better the boon 
of health than after a severe spell of illness. How 
much brighter the sunshine seems, after a long 
period of storm and cloudy weather ! Who feels 
so keenly the charms of home as the returning 
exile? 

Fortunate are they who take this sensible 
view of affliction, who make a virtue of necessity, 
and are able to draw good even out of seeming 
evil; who, instead of losing hope, bring them- 
selves to realize that the longest night must have 
an end, and that the darkest hour comes just be- 
fore the dawn. 



i 



[October 6, 1909.] 

PARENTAL RESPONSIBILITY 

N HIS recent report ascribing criminality 
among children mainly to parental neglect, 



48 Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 

the Juvenile Court judge strikes at the very root 
of the evil. No doubt, environment counts for a 
vast deal in the moulding of youth. Other things 
being equal, the child reared amid favorable sur- 
roundings has a great advantage over the child 
of the slums. Unquestionably, many are held in 
high regard today who might be occupying prison 
cells had their lines been cast in a morally un- 
healthy atmosphere. And, on the other hand, 
many who are now wearing the striped suit of 
the convict would have become a credit to them- 
selves and their forbears, if their associations had 
been different. However, after all has been said, 
environment is not everything ; and the evil influ- 
ence of the very worst surroundings can be coun- 
teracted by proper training. There is not one of 
us, perhaps, who could not verify this by point- 
ing to living proofs. Rare flowers have been 
known to bloom and flourish even on a muck 
heap. 

As Pope wisely informs us : " 'Tis education 
forms the common mind, and as the twig is bent 
the tree's inclined." Unfortunately, too many 
parents think they have done their duty by their 
children when they have hustled them off to 
school to get a smattering of secular knowledge. 
This is instruction, if you will, but not education. 
Education means something more than mere in- 
formation. It means the bringing out of all the 
good there is in the child; the development of 
all his faculties or powers — not of the mind alone, 
but of the heart and soul as well. The whole 
work cannot possibly be done in the classroom. 



Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 49 

Much still remains for the parents. And the 
chief factor in parental guidance is the influence 
of good example. Judicious correction is whole- 
some and necessary, but unless the example go 
along with it, it will count for little or nothing. 
As the Latins have it : "Verba movent, exempla 
trahunt" (Words move; example compels"). 

Our Scripture readers will remember that 
Christ "began to do and to teach." The ex- 
ample went before the precept. The child is an 
imitative animal, and he is far more apt to follow 
our practice than our counsel. It is the height 
of folly in parents to expect to cure children of 
vicious practices to which they themselves are 
palpably addicted. The child will reason that 
what is good enough for the parents is good 
enough for itself. 

In the matter of correction, it is safe to say that 
reproofs given in the heat of passion are generally 
wasted. A word uttered in calmer moments, and 
with full deliberation, will have far more weight. 
Over-severity is almost as baneful in its effects as 
over-indulgence. Constant nagging only serves 
to harden and embitter the child of spirit, and 
make him long for the day when he will be able 
to shake off the galling yoke. And when that day 
comes, he is likely to shake it off with a vengeance 
— in proportion to the strain he has been under. 
The parent who seeks to avoid the imputation of 
neglect by going to the opposite extreme is simply 
"steering clear of Charybdis to founder upon 
Scylla." Vastly wiser and more beneficial is the 
policy of those who treat their children like human 



50 Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 

beings, who manage to win their love and confi- 
dence by entering into their childish lives — their 
joys and sorrows, their pleasures and hopes. 

Needless to say, all children are not cast in the 
same mold, and it is a huge mistake to treat them 
as though they were. If "the proper study of man- 
kind is man," it is doubly incumbent on parents 
to study the bent and temperament of their off- 
spring to know how to deal with them. They 
owe this both to God and country. It is essential 
for the upbringing of their children as good 
citizens of the Commonwealth, and loyal subjects 
of the King of kings. 



[October 13, 1909.] 

A PLEA FOR THE ERRING 

THOSE whom duty brings into contact with 
the erring, know how difficult it is for fallen 
men and women — especially the latter — to redeem 
or rehabilitate themselves. The Jean Valjean of 
Victor Hugo's "Les Miserables" stands not alone 
in this respect. He is a true type of a large class 
who find even long years of repentance and atone- 
ment powerless to blot out the memory of the 
past, or undo the disastrous consequences of one 
false step. We know whereof we speak. We 
have met such time and time again. The attitude 
of the pseudo-saints toward the poor unfortunates 
who have lapsed from grace, forcibly reminds us 
of Christ's narrative anent the man who "went 



Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 51 

down from Jerusalem to Jerico and fell among 
robbers." While he lay by the roadside, half dead, 
the highly respected priest and the Levite passed 
him by without bestowing any more attention 
on him than if he were the carcass of a dumb 
brute. It was the obscure and despised Samari- 
tan — an utter stranger — who came to his aid and 
acted the part of a friend. This parable of the 
gentle and compassionate Jesus — this sad com- 
mentary on man's inhumanity to man — was 
spoken for all time, and is just as applicable today 
as it was twenty centuries ago. Now, as then, in- 
stead of lending a helping hand to those who have 
wandered from the strait and narrow path, too 
many professing Christians pass them by with a 
shrug of the shoulders and a glance of contempt, 
like the proud Pharisee, inwardly thanking God 
that they are not as these poor publicans ; while in 
all probability, the objects of their disgust, like 
the Gospel publican, are far better in the sight 
of God, Who is the only competent judge, Who 
alone knows the strength of their temptations, and 
the efforts they made to conquer, and Who reads 
perhaps in the hearts of the fallen more genuine 
character and loyalty than can be found in the 
carping critics, with all their sanctimoniousness 
and sense of superiority, and pious rolling and up- 
ward turning of eyes in holy horror and indigna- 
tion. 

So cocksure are these modern Pharisees, so 
self-satisfied, so snugly encased in their little 
shell of conventional religion and respectability, 
that they seem utterly unaware of their own fail- 



52 Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 

ings, and the possibility of their falling, one day, 
from their supposed high eminence, down even 
unto the lowest depths. It would be well for 
them to bring home to themselves the warning 
words of Holy Writ: "Let him that standeth, 
take heed lest he fall." When such people do 
fall, small wonder that we can scarcely find it 
in our heart to pity them, for they richly deserve 
their fate. George Eliot once said "I've never 
any pity for conceited people, for I think they 
carry their comfort about with them." It is a 
sentiment which many of us can heartily endorse. 
How any one can be utterly void of compas- 
sion for the repentant wrongdoer, and still claim 
to be a true Christian, is altogether beyond us. 
Such a one may indeed conform to the externals 
of Christianity, but certainly the vital sap is gone 
out of his religion. It is burned up, dried up, 
dead ; for he is lacking in its most essential qual- 
ity — love of the brotherhood. The most striking 
feature of Christ's life was His human sympathy, 
or compassion, for sinners. It is this characteris- 
tic that sets Him out in bold relief against the 
religious leaders of His time. When Magdalen, 
Zaccheus, Levi the taxgatherer, and the woman 
taken in adultery, were brought before His 
bar of judgment, He did not cast them off 
with scorn and reproaches as the ancient and 
modern Pharisees would have done, but received 
them with open arms, and cordially welcomed 
them back to His Father's house. Such, too, was 
His treatment of the prodigal son, the strayed 
sheep, etc. In fact, He seemed to take a peculiar 



Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 53 

delight in styling Himself the Good Shepherd. 
His relations with sinners prove fully the truth 
of the old adage: "To err is human; to forgive, 
divine." 

And such is the character of all who are truly 
and really Christ's. The more like to Him they 
are, the more compassionate and forgiving are 
they likewise. Experience shows that those who 
are freest from vice are at the same time the 
most merciful and considerate in their dealings 
with the unfortunate. To push back to earth, and 
trample in the dust, the poor fallen wretch who 
is trying to get on his feet, is something so odious 
that no fitting terms can be found to characterize 
it. And those who do it are surely none of 
Christ's, appearances to the contrary notwith- 
standing. 



[October 20, 1909.] 

LITERARY INFLUENCES 

A CLOSE student of human nature once said : 
"Give me the making of a nation's ballads, 
and I care not who make its laws." He might 
have said the same with equal truth, not only 
of a nation's ballads, but of its literature gener- 
ally. Among the influences that affect our lives 
most powerfully — that tend to make or mar 
character — few are more active or dominant than 
reading. And if this is true of the average man 
or woman, it applies much more forcibly to those 
who are naturally susceptible or impressionable. 



54 Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 

To many persons, especially those endowed with a 
vivid imagination, the heroes and heroines of fic- 
tion seem almost as real and tangible as if they 
were living realities. They are the patterns after 
which the admiring reader endeavors to shape 
his views and conduct. Hence the transcendent 
importance, particularly for these latter, of choos- 
ing none but the best, and eschewing, above all, 
the silly novels that trade in mawkish senti- 
mentalism. 

One's favorite, habitual reading matter is a 
pretty safe gauge of his mental and moral caliber, 
and we cannot be very far astray in judging one's 
character by his literary ideals. Persons of noble 
minds and high aims have no relish for trash. 
Some, of course — such as book reviewers and 
those who are called upon to direct others — are 
obliged by their office or duty to wade through 
a lot of this filthy stuff; and in their case, it is to 
be presumed that they have sufficient sense and 
judgment to keep them from contamination. 
Their position is like that of the physician or sur- 
geon who must of necessity come in contact with 
things corrupt and revolting, and who endures 
them, not because he likes them, but in order to 
do away with them eventually, and promote purity 
and cleanliness. 

For the rest, if they value their moral welfare, 
it is not only advisable, but absolutely necessary, 
to beware of the literary sewage of free love and 
unbridled licentiousness. The sacred Scriptures 
inform us that "he who loves danger shall perish 
in it." Those who put their hands in the fire 



Msre Hints: Moral and Social. 55 

must expect to be burned. He who indulges in 
immoral reading may escape for a time, but sooner 
or later he is sure to be caught in the meshes. 
Someone has said : "Throw enough mud, and 
some of it is bound to stick." And certainly those 
who wallow and revel in the mire must inevitably 
be smirched by it. It is foolhardy in the extreme 
to count on emerging spotless from such moral 
cesspools as the obscene, degrading novels that 
have come to us in the past few years from across 
the water. Prudence demands that we refrain 
from even naming the wretched productions we 
have in mind, lest the bare mention of them 
arouse curiosity and incite to their perusal. The 
wonder is that their degenerate authors — those 
apostles of dirt, those corrupters of youth, and 
would-be destroyers of domestic purity — are not 
in the penitentiary. They are worse than ordi- 
nary murderers, for they kill human souls. 'Tis 
a pity the law has not made it a gravely crimi- 
nal offense to write, publish or sell those wan- 
tonly suggestive works which tend to undermine 
and sap the moral life of the reader. 

They want to depict life as it is, forsooth — 
the actual, the real, instead of the ideal. But is 
it necessary to go into the sewers and gutters and 
brothels to find real life? The truth is that, far 
from painting life as it is, they invariably give it 
to us in its most abnormal and morbid phases. 

Bacon tells us that "some books are to be 
tasted, others to be swallowed, and some few to 
be chewed and digested." Had he known or fore- 
seen the products of the modern school of filthy 



56 Mmz Hints: Moral and Social'. 

realism, he might have added : "And some are to 
be cast into the flames unopened, and the sooner 
the better." 

However, there is another and a brighter side 
to the literary picture. For, if the literature of 
the decadents works incalculable evil, so, too, 
high-class, sound, healthy literature is a source 
of untold good. Presenting morality not in the 
abstract merely, but in the concrete, personifying 
or embodying it in characters who live up to 
high ideals, it is interesting as well as profitable, 
and thereby has a decided advantage over the 
set moral discourse, and frequently accomplishes 
as much, if not more, good. In the event of a 
doubt as to the wholesome or unwholesome in- 
fluence of a book, the poet Southey gives us a 
fairly safe guide: "Would you know whether 
the tendency of a book is good or evil? Examine 
in what state of mind you lay it down." In other 
words, judge of it by its effect. It is the test 
given us by the Master long ages since: "The 
tree is known by its fruits." 



[October 27, 1909.] 

THE STAGE— PAST AND PRESENT 

TIME was when the stage proved an invalu- 
able aid to religion and morality; when it 
was, in fact, an influence more efficacious in 
some respects than formal preaching — for the 
good, moral drama is really a sermon in action, 
often appealing to the imagination more power- 
fully than words. We are not so much of a 



Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 5? 

laudator temp oris acti as to maintain that this 
state of things has completely passed away. 
There are still many excellent, healthy and up- 
lifting dramas on the boards, and all honor both 
to those who composed, and those who patronize 
them ! But it is certainly a far cry from the 
tragedies of the ancient Greeks, and the mysteries 
and miracle plays of mediaeval times to some of 
the well-known productions that disgrace the 
modern stage. In its origin, the drama was pri- 
marily religious in character. Religion and 
morality were the dominant features, too, in the 
plays of the Middle Ages. We have a striking 
instance of this in the still living Passion Play 
of Oberammergau. But the pagan Renaissance 
of the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries did its 
best to put an end to all that, and from its posi- 
tion as the ally of religion and good morals — an 
incentive to right thinking and right living — the 
drama rapidly degenerated into a force making 
for evil. 

That poetry in general, and the drama in par- 
ticular, lose nothing by serving as the handmaids 
of religion, is amply evidenced by the fact that 
many of the greatest dramatic or poetic produc- 
tions of all times have been more or less of this 
character. Witness the creations of an Aeschylus 
and a Sophocles, the "Divina Commedia" of 
Dante, Tasso's "Jerusalem Delivered," Milton's 
"Paradise Lost," to say nothing of some recent 
very creditable efforts in the same line. Rarely, 
if ever, in mediaeval or modern times, has the 
drama been carried to such a high pitch of per- 



58 Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 

fection, as in the Spain of Calderon and Lope de 
Vega, from whom both France and England 
have borrowed largely. And the Spanish drama 
of those days was essentially and characteristi- 
cally religious. 

Of course, our reference to the quondam reli- 
gious and moral character of the drama is not 
meant to imply that the stage of today should 
be a catechetical school of religion and morality. 
No one expects that much. But we all have a 
perfect right to expect, and demand, that at least 
it present nothing positively detrimental to the 
religious and moral sense of its patrons ; and our 
allusion to its one-time position as exponent and 
defender of religion and morals strongly empha- 
sizes this right. 

Writing in one of the Sunday newspapers a 
few weeks ago, an American theatrical manager, 
well known on both sides of the Atlantic, gave 
it as his belief that, taken all in all, the stage was 
never better than it is at present. That is true 
enough as regards costuming, scenic effect, etc. 
It may be true, too, as far as the private lives 
of* the players are concerned. On this point we 
have hardly sufficient data for making a compari- 
son. But there is one thing well worthy of note 
in contrasting the past and present of the theatre, 
and that is the difference in the methods of pre- 
senting vice. No doubt, in the days of Charles 
II and Queen Anne, the stage exhibited more 
horseplay, more coarseness or vulgarity than we 
find today. But, after all, such exhibitions are 
not half so hurtful as the modern style of in- 



Mere: Hints: Moral and Social. 59 

nuendo. Vice stalking abroad in all its naked- 
ness, becomes loathsome and repellent. It is the 
clever hint, the veiled allusion, and the half dis- 
closure that work the greatest havoc. The worst 
feature of some of the best-known modern pro- 
ductions is their suggestiveness ; and there is 
not the slightest injustice in classing such plays 
among the devil's own tactics. From a moral 
standpoint, the melodramatic performances of the 
blood-and-thunder type, given in the second and 
third rate houses, are vastly preferable to many 
of the more ambitious, but diabolically insidious, 
attractions offered by some of the miscalled high- 
grade theatres. For, crude as they are, often 
lacking in probability, artistic taste, and other 
features that appeal to the cultured theatregoer, 
these sensational gems have at least, as a rule, 
the merit of painting virtue and vice in their true 
colors, so as to leave no doubt in the minds of 
the audience as to what is deemed worthy of 
admiration, and what deserves their withering 
contempt. 

President Taft and Senator Knox set a fine 
example, a few months ago, by leaving a Wash- 
ington theatre during the rendition of a shady 
performance ; and if that example were followed 
by the respectable element generally-— by those to 
whom the rank and file look for light and guid- 
ance — doubtless we would soon be rid of these 
questionable, and often downright immoral, ex- 
hibitions which leave such foul blotches on the 
modern stage. The managements would be 
forced to eliminate them, if for no other reasor, 
because they wouldn't pay. 



60 Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 

[November 3, 1909.] 

DEED VS. WORDS 

THERE is hardly a more disagreeable com- 
panion, or a greater bore, than the habitual 
boaster. Sensible people put little or no trust 
in the man who is incessantly laying claim to 
a title which he cannot prove by deeds. Works 
count for more than words, and we are natur- 
ally inclined to judge a man rather by what 
he does than by what he says. The old soldier 
who has won his laurels on many a hotly con- 
tested battlefield, amid the whizzing of bullets 
and the cannon's roar, has no need to proclaim 
aloud his bravery on every street corner. His 
deeds speak far more eloquently than words. 
It isn't necessary for the man who has made 
great sacrifices for his country's weal to be ever- 
lastingly prating about his patriotism. Every- 
body admits it. His actions are his best cre- 
dentials. Such is the standard of judgment the 
world over. No prudent man of business will 
place implicit confidence in an untried employee, 
be he ever so highly recommended. A man may 
be all that he claims — and more. But in spite 
of that, we are fully justified in declining to ac- 
cept him at his own rating, until he has proved 
by his deeds that his own rating is the proper 
one, and that he has not overrated himself. 

The point cannot be better illustrated than 
by a reference to the methods of Christ on 
more than one occasion. When His hearers re- 



Mere: Hints: Moral and Social,. 61 

fused to receive His own account of Himself 
He confidently referred them to His works: "If 
you will not believe Me, believe My works, for 
they give testimony of Me." If you are un- 
willing to judge Me by what I say, then judge 
Me by what I do. It is the old staple argument 
of cause and effect, of the tree and its fruits. 
When John the Baptist sent some of his fol- 
lowers to question Jesus concerning His mis- 
sion, the latter, instead of setting forth a for- 
midable array of verbal proofs, simply pointed 
to His achievements : "Go and tell John what 
you have seen and heard. The blind see, the 
deaf hear, the dumb speak," etc. It was the 
best reply He could have given. The argument 
was unanswerable and, for those who had eyes 
to see, and were not blinded by prejudice, ab- 
solutely convincing. Here are the fruits. They 
are undeniably good. Hence the tree that bore 
them must itself be sound and healthy, for the 
evil tree cannot bring forth good fruit. Here 
are the effects. The cause must be proportioned 
to them. 

Exaggerated pride of ancestry is another form 
of boasting, less odious, perhaps, than self-lauda- 
tion, but sometimes far more pitiable. St. Paul, 
with his wonted practical philosophy, advises 
his readers not to "glory beyond measure in 
other men's labors. * * * But let every man 
prove his own work, and so he shall have glory 
in himself only and not in another." And Christ 
time and again upbraided His contemporaries 
for priding themselves on the deeds of their 



62 Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 

fathers, without making any effort to imitate 
them. "Bring forth fruits worthy of penance," 
said John the Baptist, "and think not to say 
within yourselves, 'We have Abraham for our 
father.' " They who live on the deeds or reputa- 
tion of their ancestors are moral parasites. 
What merit or credit do they deserve for the 
achievements of their kith and kin? Surely, the 
mere accident of birth or blood relationship gives 
them no right to glory. "Noblesse oblige." The 
fact that one has the blood of heroes or sages 
flowing in his veins, is an additional reason for 
expecting great things of himself. And if he 
fails to measure up to their standard, or to emu- 
late them, then their wise or valorous deeds, 
instead of reflecting any glory upon him, only 
redound to his greater shame. Few are more 
deserving of contempt than the degenerate scion 
of a noble house who rests supinely on his oars 
and seeks to crown himself with the borrowed 
laurels of his sires. And what we say of an- 
cestral pride applies equally to the boasting of 
one's illustrious compatriots. If the noble deeds 
of those who have gone before arouse no echo 
in our hearts; if they do not incite us to aim at 
the same lofty ideals — to tend toward the same 
goal — there is assuredly no rhyme or reason in 
our glorying, but, on the contrary, every reason 
to hang our heads in shame. 



Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 63 

[November 10, 1909.] 

THE HUMAN OCTOPUS 

THE Bible tells us that "covetousness is the 
root of all evils;" but it tells us also that 
"every creature of God is good," and money is 
no exception to the rule. It is not money that 
the sacred writers condemn, but rather the in- 
ordinate love of it. Good in itself, it becomes a 
source of evil, only when men set their hearts 
upon it, become slaves to it, and worship it as 
their god. Few vices are more roundly scored 
in Holy Writ than that of avarice. The 
wise man does not hesitate to term it "the ser- 
vice of idols," and assures us that "there is not 
a more wicked thing than to love money." And 
no wonder, for we know from experience that 
once the spirit of insatiable greed takes posses- 
sion of a man's heart, he will stoop to almost 
anything to compass his desires. The well- 
springs of human kindness are dried up within 
him, and nothing at all is worth his while, save 
the quest of the glittering gold. 

One of the most loathsome of God's creatures 
is the ugly, slimy octopus, or devil-fish, and 
one of the most blood-curdling sights imagina- 
ble is to behold it seizing its unsuspecting prey 
in its tentacles, and clasping the wretched vic- 
tim in its foul embrace, till death in mercy puts 
an end to the tortures of the writhing, agonized 
creature. The image of this horrid thing, and its 
revolting process of blood-sucking, remind us 
forcibly of the avaricious money-grinder. Him- 



64 Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 

self and the disgusting devil-fish are sufficiently 
alike in method to be classed in the same family. 
He has no more heart than the octopus. Every- 
thing is food that comes his way. Charity, jus- 
tice, religion, patriotism — all must yield and 
bend before his overmastering passion of greed. 
At first blush the picture may seem to be a 
little too highly colored. But it isn't. It is fact, 
not fancy. We could lay our hand on many 
such men without going very far out of our way. 
Their name, unfortunately, is legion. The world 
is full of them, and we are brushing against them 
every hour of the day. Not all, of course, have 
fallen to the lowest depths. There are grades in 
avarice, as in every other vice. But in one de- 
gree or another, they, abound among us, in the 
shape of misers, "cornerers," loan sharks, and the 
thousands of others who prey and batten upon 
the helplessness of their fellow-men. It is these 
human vampires who enrich themselves by tak- 
ing heavy toll of the sweat and blood of their 
brethren, whom St. James the Apostle addresses 
in such scathing terms: "Go to, ye rich men, 
weep and howl for the miseries that shall come 
upon you. Behold, the hire of the laborers who 
have reaped your fields, of which you have de- 
frauded them, crieth out, and their cry hath 
entered into the ears of the Lord of Sabaoth." 
And the Almighty, speaking through Moses: 
"You shall not wrong the widows and the orphan. 
And if you do wrong them, they will cry unto 
Me, and I shall hear their cry, and My wrath 
shall be stirred up against you." 



Mere: Hints: Moral and Social. 65 

Avarice is not confined to any one class. The 
immensely rich may be absolutely free from it, 
and the very poorest saturated with it. It is the 
spirit of greed, and not the possession of money, 
that marks the covetous man. And wherever 
it is found, in rich or poor, it begets the same 
results, the same hardheartedness and insensi- 
bility to the claims of the needy. If "charity 
covers a multitude of sins," avarice is the foster- 
ing parent of a multitude of the meanest vices. 
It is a trait which deservedly renders its pos- 
sessor as odious in the judgment of his fellow- 
men, as he is in the sight of his God. 



[November ly, 1909.} 

SURE TEST OF TRUE GOODNESS 

ONE of the axioms of the Middle Age 
philosophers was : "Bomim est diffusivum 
sui" which may be freely translated: "Good 
likes to spread itself." The tendency to com- 
municate itself to others, is inseparable from true 
goodness." Unselfishness is an unerring mark of 
genuine virtue, and any brand that bears another 
label is infallibly counterfeit. There never yet 
lived a really good selfish man, for goodness and 
selfishness are as diametrically opposed to each 
other as the opposite poles of the earth. The 
combination may sometimes seem to exist, but it 
is only apparent and superficial. As well try to 
mix oil and water, as to make a harmonious blend 



66 Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 

of goodness and self-seeking. The real lover of 
truth feels irresistibly impelled to impart his 
knowledge. The religion of the self-centered, 
who are so exclusively occupied with their own 
salvation that they have no time or care for the 
needs of their fellow-men, is undoubtedly 
spurious. It has no real existence outside their 
own shallow minds. When Fortune smiles on 
those who are truly good at heart, instantly they 
hasten to share their luck with the less favored. 
In the circle in which they move, they make their 
presence felt by the genial warmth and light 
which issue from them, like the rays of the sun 
in the heavens, enlivening and brightening the 
rugged path of their suffering fellow-travelers 
through the cold and cheerless Vale of Afflic- 
tion. 

While there are many such among us, the 
world, after all, cannot be such a bad place to 
abide. Were there many more such, the bur- 
dens of life would assuredly be very much lighter 
than they are. We need not theorize, or stop to 
prove what we say of the nature of true good- 
ness. We have substantial proofs in abundance 
roundabout us. Scarcely a day passes without 
its record of praiseworthy benefactions — of the 
noble efforts made by men and women, as rich 
in genuine virtue as they are in worldly goods, 
to alleviate the miseries of their less fortunate 
brethren. If all our multimillionaires were like 
Schwab, and others of his ilk whose names and 
kindly deeds are known to the public, there 
would be far less bitterness of feeling between 



Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 67 

the plutocratic upper ten and the impoverished, 
submerged thousands. Time and again we have 
it dinned into our ears, as one of the chief rea- 
sons for the overthrow of the modern industrial 
system, that it tends inevitably to make the rich 
richer, and the poor poorer. If, under present 
conditions, the millions must necessarily go to 
a comparative few, God grant that at least they 
may continue to flow into the hands of those who 
will use them — or, at any rate, a considerable 
part of them — for the benefit of their fellow- 
men. 

For ages man has been looking forward to 
the millennium — to the golden age of abundance, 
when poverty will be a thing unknown. But the 
millennium has not yet come, and the bald truth 
is, it never will come. It is elusive as the mirage 
in the desert. The limpid waters in which the 
weary traveler means to slake his thirst are 
ever looming up before him; but no matter how 
far or how rapidly he advances, they are ever- 
equidistant. It is an optical illusion. There is 
no water. And there is no millennium. As 
long as the world shall last, so long will poverty 
and suffering exist. As Christ tells us: "The 
poor you have always with you." Men may, 
and will, continue till the crack of doom, to form 
to themselves fanciful schemes for the better- 
ment of their kind; but the end will find them as 
far from perfection as they were at the begin- 
ning. The closest possible approach to the mil- 
lennium will have been reached, when men of 
wealth and ability universally recognize and per- 



68 Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 

form their individual duties to their fellow-man. 
This is the best, and the only practical, solution 
of the great, world-wide social problem. 



[November 24, 1909.] 

THANKSGIVING 

IT may not be amiss to recall to mind that when 
our forefathers instituted a day of national 
thanksgiving, they had no intention whatsoever 
of setting apart a day for the sole purpose 
of turkey-eating and general festivity. Their 
motive was far deeper and far more serious than 
that. It was the genuinely religious motive of 
returning thanks to the Giver of all good gifts 
for the favors bestowed upon us as a people or 
nation. 

To the truly appreciative man, every day will 
be, in a sense, a day of thanksgiving for individ- 
ual benefits received. He will. not confine him- 
self to stated periods; least of all, to one paltry 
day in the year. But Thanksgiving Day is ex- 
pressly consecrated to the giving of thanks by 
the whole people in unison, for the national 
advantages which they enjoy, for the success of 
our arms, the establishment and preservation 
of our free republic, for the immense material 
wealth lavished upon our country, etc. It is 
not rare to find nations losing sight of the original 
intent and purpose of their national holidays, 



Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 69 

and converting into base or common uses what 
was intended primarily for their moral uplift. 
God grant that this may never be true of our 
national day of thanksgiving, for certainly no 
other nation under Heaven has more reason to 
be thankful than the people of this liberty-loving 
and liberty-giving land. 

An old cynic has denned gratitude as "a. lively 
sense of future benefits/'' and if we consider it 
not as it really is or should be, but as it is only 
too commonly practiced among us, we shall 
find a great deal of truth in his definition. The 
Master once delivered a sermon on the subject 
of ingratitude — an illustrated sermon. The oc- 
casion was the cure of the ten lepers. He said 
little, but the little He did say struck, and still 
strikes, home. Ten men besought Christ to 
heal them. The ten were healed. Only one of 
the ten returned to give thanks. And the Great 
Healer, looking upon him, queried sadly: "And 
where are the nine others?" Have they so soon 
forgotten? Yes, they got what they wanted 
and that was the end of it. They went their 
way rejoicing, recking little of Him to Whom 
they owed their rejoicing. We all know that 
this is not a solitary or very exceptional instance. 
It is common enough. It might be well for us 
to ask ourselves honestly on this day if it is not 
a case of "de te fabula narratur." 

The favor seekers can be numbered by the 
billions, but those who return thanks are com- 
paratively few and far between, and even of 
those who do, perhaps quite a large propor- 



70 Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 

tion have solely or principally in view the ob- 
taining of further favors, thereby justifying the 
cynic's notion of gratitude. Men may be duped 
or imposed upon by such insincere professions. 
They may, and often do, mistake the hollow 
sound for the true ring. But not so the Al- 
mighty, Whose all-seeing Eye pries into the hid- 
den depths. He is not to be mocked or hood- 
winked, and of those whose gratitude is only 
make-believe He may well say what He said of 
some others long ago : "These people honor Me 
with their lips, but their heart is far from Me." 

In fact, it is hard to get some people to admit 
that they have anything to be thankful for. In 
their overweening pride and selfishness, they act 
as though God were made for man — not man for 
God. They seem to regard what is done for 
them as their due or birthright. They are the 
very people who get far more than they deserve, 
and infinitely more than they give; the people, 
indeed, who give nothing that they are not abso- 
lutely forced to give. Were their deserts meas- 
ured by human standards, or weighed in the 
scales of strict human justice, they would fare 
worse than they do with Almighty God. They 
are not half as reasonable with their Maker as 
they are with their fellow-men. They seldom 
think of applying the Golden Rule in their deal- 
ings with Him. 

The odium which attaches to the ingrate is 
truly well deserved. Gratitude is not only a 
dictate of reason, but likewise an instinct of 
the brute creation, and the man who lacks it is, 



Mere: Hints: Moral, and Social. 71 

in that one respect at least, inferior to the brute. 
It is to be hoped that none of us will deserve 
that stigma tomorrow, by forgetting the Giver 
in the midst of His gifts. While entering fully 
into the festive spirit of the day, it behooves 
us to keep well in mind its more serious side and 
to let our hearts go out in genuine gratitude 
to Him from Whom all blessings flow. 



[December i, 1909.'] 

DIVES AND LAZARUS 

THE point touched upon two weeks ago, con- 
cerning the relations of rich and poor, is 
not a mere matter of choice or counsel, but a 
positive duty. That those who have more than 
their share of the world's wealth are bound to 
help the needy, is a dictate of reason, as well as 
a precept of divine law. God never intended that 
Dives should revel in luxury while Lazarus is 
starving at his door. Inequalities of wealth there 
must, and ever will be, under any and every 
social or industrial system. It is a condition 
necessarily resulting from the inevitable and un- 
alterable mental and physical inequalities of the 
human race; and every scheme that has for its 
object the reduction of all mankind to the same 
property level is purely Utopian, and must of 
necessity fail. All have not the same allotment 
of brains or brawn, and if all were made equal in 
point of wealth today, the brains and brawn 



72 Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 

would be on top again tomorrow. But, while 
the distribution of wealth will ever remain un- 
equal, and while no man is obliged to yield up 
what is required for the suitable maintenance 
of his proper station in life, common sense itself 
will suggest that no one man, or no body of 
men, has the right to hoard up extravagantly 
superfluous treasures to the detriment of the peo- 
ple at large. As there is but a limited supply 
of the means of subsistence, it stands to reason 
that if some have too much, others will suffer 
want. Hence the necessity for an equitable divi- 
sion, if not to even-up things, at least to prevent 
destitution. 

There is no social or economic heresy in this. 
It is the plain, unvarnished social and economic 
teaching of both the Old and the New Testa- 
ment. Both are replete with proofs that man is 
not the absolute or arbitrary master of the super- 
fluous goods in his possession; but rather the 
steward, or custodian, holding them in trust for 
the benefit of his fellow-men. The early Chris- 
tians were certainly not extreme Socialists, in 
the modern sense of the term, and yet we know 
that they went so far as to possess all things 
in common. St. James the Apostle makes reli- 
gion itself synonymous with practical charity: 
"Religion pure and undefiled with God and the 
Father is this : to visit [help] the orphans and 
widows in their distress." St. John identifies 
love of God with beneficence to His creatures : 
"He who has the substance of this world and sees 
his brother in need, and closes the bowels of 



Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 73 

mercy, or charity, against him, how doth the 
love of God abide in him?" And, strongest of 
all, Christ Himself, while insisting on the im- 
portance of belief, yet makes beneficence the 
standard by which He shall judge the world. 
Not every one that saith "Lord, Lord," shall 
enter into His kingdom, but : "I was ahungered, 
and ye gave Me to eat; thirsty, and ye gave Me 
to drink; naked, and ye clothed Me," etc. 

It is sometimes claimed that the money ex- 
pended on extravagantly lavish entertainments 
is not misspent, since it finds its way into the 
natural channels of commerce, and thereby ulti- 
mately benefits the community at large. There 
is some truth in this. Far better thus than to 
have it lie idle in the cofTers of the rich. But 
how vastly much more good could be accom- 
plished by devoting these superfluous funds to 
the endowment of hospitals, asylums, educa- 
tional institutions, etc. Besides, not infrequently 
it is precisely the sight, or accounts, of these 
worse than pagan saturnalia, that drive the hun- 
gry thousands to the brink of madness, that add 
fuel to the fire of the would-be levelers, and pre- 
cipitate disastrous social revolutions for the pur- 
pose of equalizing conditions. The men and 
women of wealth have the remedy, or preventive, 
in their own hands. It is in their power to bind 
the poor to them with hooks stronger than those 
of steel, or to estrange them beyond repair. His- 
tory repeats itself; and the not very distant fu- 
ture may show that on their choice depends their 
making or unmaking. 



74 Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 

[December 8, 1909.] 

USURY 

THOSE who are conversant with the history 
of usury know that in past ages it was 
looked upon with anything but favor. In fact, 
many of the most reputable moralists regarded 
it as nothing short of criminal, and they under- 
stood by the term "usury" not merely an ex- 
orbitant rate of interest, but any and all interest 
whatsoever. In the Old Testament the He- 
brews were forbidden to demand any compensa- 
tion for loans made to their brethren: "Thou 
shalt not lend to thy brother money to usury; 
nor corn, nor any other thing. To thy brother 
thou shalt lend that which he wanteth, without 
usury." And in the new dispensation, St. L,uke 
tells his readers to "do good and lend, hoping 
nothing thereby." The old Hebrew word for 
usury is equivalent to the English word "bite." 
Money let out at interest is likened to the bite of 
the asp. For, as the man stricken by the asp is 
lulled into a peaceful slumber from which he 
never awakes, so he who takes money at interest, 
at first is sensible only of the benefit received; 
but, like the asp's venom, the poison of usury 
gradually percolates through his system, to his 
ultimate destruction. One of the early Christian 
writers speaks of it as "homicide," and the 
ancient Chaldeans termed the practice "perdi- 
tion." 

From this it is evident that the clear-cut and 
universally recognized lawfulness of even mod- 



Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 75 

erate usury is not quite as old as the hills. Our 
forbears were not at all so sure of it. The 
morality of the question has afforded ample and 
strenuous exercise for the brains of some of the 
world's best thinkers. Roman history is full of 
the subject. And so is ancient philosophy. It 
is a debatable land for whose possession men 
of widely different professions have contended — 
theologians, ethical writers, jurisconsults, politi- 
cal economists, and civil rulers. The old mor- 
alists were generally as hostile to it, as the mod- 
ern political economists are favorable. In an 
editorial it is, of course, impossible to give de- 
tails of the controversy, to weigh the pros and 
cons, or explain the reasons for such a diversity 
of opinions. 

Our purpose in mentioning these differences 
of view is simply to show that the practice is 
fraught with difficulties and dangers, and con- 
sequently should be confined within strict limits. 
Whatever may have been the case in the past, 
whether the opponents of usury were right or 
wrong, it is certain enough that in the present 
conditions of industrial life, a moderate rate of 
interest on loans is perfectly legitimate. Those 
who would deny this nowadays — if there are 
any such — are few and far between. At any rate, 
welcome or unwelcome, it has come to stay, and 
we must make the best of it. The great trouble 
with some of the old moralists was their theory 
of the "sterility" of money. To them it was but 
a dead instrument, and the whole profit was 
due to the labor and skill of the user. Senseless 



76 Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 

as the reason may appear to us, it was not so to 
their contemporaries, for the industrial life of 
those days differed widely from ours. The mod- 
ern system of investments was non-existent. 

But there is not the slightest doubt that in 
our present way of doing things, money itself 
makes money; capital is an absolutely necessary 
means of production. And he who would assert 
that money is by nature sterile would be looked 
upon as a madman. It must be conceded, then, 
that those who lend their capital are entitled to 
a fair share of the profits, or to a moderate rate 
of interest. But here precisely is the crux. What 
constitutes a fair or moderate rate of interest? 
Opinions, as we know, vary, and different States 
have different rates. There is no infallible means 
of arriving at a solution, and in the absence of 
a better, the only thing practicable is to abide 
by the legal rate. 



[December 15, 1909.] 

HYPNOTISM AND CRIME 

NOT long ago The Sun recorded the case of 
a New Jersey hypnotist who succeeded in 
putting his subject to sleep, but was unable to 
revive him. As a result, the hypnotized man 
is dead, and the hypnotizer in jail, charged with 
homicide. Later on came news from Vassar 
of another case which, for a time, threatened to 
have a somewhat similar ending. These and 



Mer$ Hints: Moral and Social. 77 

many other like incidents which have occurred 
from time to time ought to convince us that 
hypnotism is not a matter for trifling or amuse- 
ment, or even for experiment. It should be a 
salutary warning to amateurs, and irresponsible 
persons generally, to keep hands off. Mental sug- 
gestion has already begun to play a considerable 
part in our criminal procedure, and it is destined 
to assume a still more important role in the 
future, if the practice be allowed to go un- 
checked. Hypnotism, at its best, is dangerous. 
Like strychnine or arsenic, it may prove a valu- 
able therapeutic, or a deadly poison, according to 
the amount and frequency of the dose, and the 
circumstances in which it is given. Though em- 
ployed principally in the treatment of nervous 
disorders, experienced physicians assure us that 
its frequent repetition eventually shatters the 
nervous system. And this is just what we should 
expect, since the sleep which it induces is not 
natural, but artificial and morbid, rather a men- 
tal disease than a healthy or normal rest. 

But the liability to physical injury, though 
serious enough, is by no means the darkest and 
worst side of hypnosis. In the hands of conscien- 
tious and pure-minded physicians, who use it with 
as much caution as they do other powerful rem- 
edies of the kind, it is a potent influence for good. 
But, unfortunately, the practice is not restricted 
to the virtuous. The vicious likewise possess and 
use the power ; and facts go to show that, in their 
hands, it may become a sure and speedy means 
of carrying out the most dastardly schemes, at 



78 Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 

the same time enabling the criminal to shield 
himself from the punishment which his crimes 
deserve. When we remember that the subject is 
completely under the control of the hypnotist, 
it is easy enough to realize what a wide field 
of opportunities it opens up to the libertine. 

The greater number of eminent hypnotists, 
while recognizing the value of this agent as a 
suggestive therapeutic, or imagination-cure, point 
out clearly the great moral evils likely to result 
from its abuse. The French specialists — Drs. 
Binet and Fere — quote with approval an extract 
from a secret report presented to the King of 
France by Bailly, Jussieu and our own Franklin, 
in 1784. "Women," they observe, "are always 
magnetized by men. The established relations 
are doubtless those of a patient to the physician. 
But this physician is a man, and whatever the 
illness may be, it does not deprive us of our sex; 
it does not entirely withdraw us from the power 
of the other sex * * * The magnetic treat- 
ment must of necessity be dangerous to morality. 
While proposing to cure diseases that require 
prolonged treatment, pleasing emotions are ex- 
cited, emotions to which we look back with re- 
gret, and seek to revive, * * * but morally 
they must be condemned; and they are all the 
more dangerous, as it becomes easier for them 
to be rendered habitual." There is much more 
to the same effect, some of it a great deal 
stronger and more graphic than the parts quoted. 
And bear in mind that these men were not at all 
professional moralists. The expert Dr. Charcot, 



Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 79 

the greatest authority on hypnotism, charac- 
terizes the practice as a two-edged sword. 

The upshot of the thing is that the practice 
of hypnotism should be regulated by law, just 
like the sale of cocaine or any other drug. Such 
is the case already in most of the European 
states. Russia, Prussia and Denmark have re- 
stricted the practice to the medical faculties; 
while Italy, Austria and Switzerland have taken 
steps to check its public, indiscriminate employ- 
ment. No one should be permitted to exercise 
the hypnotic power without a special license from 
the proper authorities ; and the license should 
be given only to those who will use it for the 
benefit of their fellow-men. 



[December 21, 1909.] 

ETHICS OF SUICIDE 

THE large and seemingly increasing number 
of suicides reported from day to day may 
well give rise to a little serious reflection on 
the ethics of self-destruction. The more fre- 
quently such deplorable incidents occur, the more 
we become familiarized with them, and the less 
heinous they are likely to appear, especially when 
the element of pity enters in. The sober truth 
of the matter is that suicide is a most serious 
crime, both against God and human society. For 
one who has any real faith in God and His 
Providence, who believes that the Almighty 



80 Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 

placed us here for a definite purpose, insanity is 
the only passable excuse for the act. No man, 
however heavy his burdens, has a moral right to 
throw away the life that God gave him. The 
Lord God alone is the absolute Master of life 
and death; He has put us here in the capacity 
of sentinels, and he who abandons his post is a 
traitor to his God. This is the first and best 
consideration for the believer in a future life — 
that in usurping Divine power, he is guilty of 
grave disloyalty to his Maker. 'Tis "the dread 
of something after death, the undiscovered coun- 
try from whose bourn no traveler returns," that 
"makes us rather bear those ills we have, than fly 
to others that we know not of." 

But even apart from religious faith, there are 
strong — overwhelmingly strong — reasons from 
other sources to deter the man of honor from 
such a course. The natural law and common 
sense cry out against it as gravely injurious to 
society at large, and particularly to that portion 
of it in which our lot is cast. If no 
loftier motive will appeal to the man contem- 
plating suicide, his regard and consideration for 
others should prove a sufficient deterrent. Self- 
destruction is the offspring of selfishness ; and 
perhaps this is the meanest thing about it. No 
man liveth or dieth to himself alone. There are 
others concerned. And if the would-be suicide 
cares naught for his own life, at least he might 
have some thought for those who are, or should 
be, near and dear to him; he might think of the 
disgrace his act will bring upon them, the heart- 



Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 81 

rending grief it will cause, of the destitution 
that may follow in its wake for those who are 
dependent on him for their means of support. 
No life need be wholly useless, and if one has 
reason to look upon his own life as of little 
or no use, his remedy is to better, not to destroy, 
it. 

Against the suicide whose mind is deranged, 
of course there is nothing to be said — except this, 
perhaps, that in a large percentage of even these 
cases, the mental derangement itself might have 
been prevented by taking a sensible view of 
life and its misfortunes. Suicidal mania results 
either from the supposed unbearableness of 
imaginary ills, or, oftener, from magnifying and 
brooding over real and serious afflictions. Such 
an attitude of mind is an evident sign of weak- 
ness, not necessarily reprehensible in its be- 
ginnings, inasmuch as it may arise from one's 
physical condition — but curable if the patient 
will consent to use the remedy, and the remedy 
is clearly a change of viewpoint; to cease play- 
ing the baby, and look at things from the stand- 
point of the full-grown adult; to submit grace- 
fully to the inevitable and endeavor to make the 
best of it. Habit is overcome by habit, and it 
is the plain duty of those who have a recognized 
tendency to suicidal brooding and melancholy, to 
do all that lies in their power to acquire opposite 
habits; otherwise they make themselves morally 
responsible for the awful result — for he who puts 
the cause deliberately, is answerable for the ef- 
fect. 



82 Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 

It is well for us to remember at times, when 
our burden of grief seems too heavy to bear, that 
the very heaviest and worst will be lifted some 
day at least. There is no valid reason for despon- 
dency. Time is a great healer, as our previous 
experiences must have taught us. No earthly 
grief is eternal in duration. As a wise and cheer- 
ful old poet has it: 

Not always fall of leaf, nor ever spring, 
Not endless night, yet not eternal day; 
The saddest birds a season find to sing, 
The roughest storm a calm may soon allay. 
Thus with succeeding turns, God tempereth all, 
That man may hope to rise, yet fear to fall. 

There is no poetry or romance about delibe- 
rate suicide. It is downright criminal. The 
suicide is not a brave man, but an arrant coward. 
It requires far greater heroism to "bear the whips 
and scorns of time, * * * to grunt and sweat 
under a weary life," than to end it all by one fell 
stroke, painful indeed, but of speedy effect. And 
we have no hesitancy whatsoever in answering 
Hamlet's famous question thus : — Decidedly 

Tis nobler in the mind to suffer 

The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune, than 

to take arms against a sea of troubles 
And end them 

by such means as the cowardly act of self-de- 
struction. 



Mere: Hints: Moral and Social. 83 

[December 22, 1909.] 

BRIGHT SIDE OF THE WORLD 

IN social, as in individual, life it is not good for 
us to be ever looking at the darkest and 
worst side of things. Such an attitude of mind 
only tends to breed a generation of chronic 
grumblers. The genuine lover of truth 
wants to see things as they are, and things are 
neither as they are painted by the optimist nor 
by the pessimist. The truth lies in the golden 
mean between the two extremes. The reader 
will doubtless recall the Quixotic legend of the 
valiant knights of yore who wrangled and fought 
over the color of the shield. One swore it was 
white, and the other as stoutly maintained it was 
black. Both were part right and part wrong, as 
the shield was white on one side and black on 
the other, and each saw only the side confronting 
his own visual organ. 

So is it with our views of life. Some see only 
the bright side, others only the dark, and as 
a result, neither is competent to judge. The 
habit of railing and ranting at existing customs 
and institutions as unqualifiedly bad, seems to 
make some people very big and virtuous in their 
own eyes. We are not referring to that just 
and tempered criticism which is prompted by 
public spirit, or a genuine zeal for the common 
good, but rather to the unmeasured abuse seem- 
ingly indulged in for its own sake, and by those 



84 Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 

who have nothing to offer by way of substitute. 
In short, it is destructive, not constructive, criti- 
cism that merits our reprobation. 

And even anent real reformers, we know that 
they are not likely to minimize the evils which 
they condemn. Perhaps we do them no injus- 
tice in saying that, as a rule, the tendency is to 
let their zeal outrun their discretion; and the 
more earnest they are, the more likely is this 
tendency to manifest itself. The perfectly poised 
philosopher, who unvaryingly keeps his heart in 
due subjection to his head, is rather a rare excep- 
tion. 

That there are in our modern life many and 
serious evils, endangering the welfare both of 
the individual and of society, is a truth which 
no one with half an eye can question. Every 
student of history knows that widespread luxury 
— and its natural offspring, effeminacy — unre- 
stricted divorce, the dissemination of infidel and 
immoral literature, and official corruption, have 
ever proved most potent factors in the destruc- 
tion of governments and nations. And these ugly 
spectres are certainly stalking about in our midst 
today. But, in spite of that, it would be far from 
the truth to say that our age is the worst ever. 
Owing to improved facilities for communication, 
and the rapid transmission of news, we know 
more about contemporary life than did our an- 
cestors, and the vicious part is apt to strike us 
more forcibly than its virtuous side, for vice is 
ever more blatant and obtrusive than virtue. 
Nevertheless, we have good reason to believe 



Mere: Hints: Moral and Social. 85 

that our era could well stand a comparison with 
the ages that are past. Notwithstanding the 
lamentations of the latter-day Jeremiahs, reli- 
gion and morality are neither dead nor dying. 
Far from passing into the sere and yellow leaf, 
they are still green, and growing vigorously. The 
opinion of the masses — the vox populi — is still 
to be found on the side of truth and righteous- 
ness. As a counterpoise to modern evils, we have 
the ever-vigilant, lynx-eyed and, in the main, un- 
corrupted public press, which, with comparative- 
ly few exceptions, is decidedly moral in tone and 
character, the sturdy opponent of evil-doers and 
the stanch defender of justice and right. 

We sometimes forget that the very hue and 
cry raised against the criminal elements, is proof 
of a thorough awakening of the public conscience, 
which shows that, after all, the modern world 
is not so hopelessly wicked. Never before did 
public opinion play such an important role in 
the world's history. 

These are a few of the points — on the bright 
side of modern life — which we would do well to 
ponder over now and then, lest, while looking 
too exclusively at the dark and evil side of the 
picture, we become confirmed pessimists, and fail 
to appreciate and develop the real good that is 
strewn everywhere about us. 



S6 Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 

[December 29, 1909.] 

TAKING STOCK 

IN ancient Rome stood a statue representing 
the god Janus (from whom our month of 
January takes its name), with two heads, looking 
in opposite directions. The time is fast ap- 
proaching — if not already here — when the old 
pagan deity will have many imitators in this 
twofold point of view. Looking backward — 
glancing forward — is the proper motto and oc- 
cupation of the present. Standing on the thres- 
hold of the new year — on the boundary line be- 
tween the new and the old — it is quite the natural 
thing for us to pass in review the momentous 
happenings of the dying year, and take thought 
for the one that will soon be ushered in. Fol- 
lowing the example of the prudent business man, 
it is advisable at this season to take an inventory 
of our moral goods, to look up the debit and 
credit sides of our books, to ascertain what are 
our moral assets and liabilities, and, as far as lies 
in our power, to square our accounts with God 
and conscience. 

For each and every one of us, the recording 
angel has added another leaf to the Book of 
Life — a leaf containing the passing year's record 
of good and evil, of opportunities utilized and 
opportunities squandered, of time employed to 
advantage and time frittered away in trifling, or 
perhaps in worse. It has often been said that 
time is money. True enough, but this is a rather 



Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 87 

sordid view. Time is infinitely more than money. 
It is the soul's capital; it is our spiritual stock- 
in-trade. Looking back at the year which is 
rapidly drawing to a close, no doubt there are 
very few of us perfectly satisfied with the use 
we have made of our time. If called upon to 
render an account of our stewardship, many 
would be forced to admit that their losses exceed 
their profits. But in spite of that, there is no rea- 
son for discouragement. If we will but take the 
means, our very losses may be turned to good 
account. The philosophic Thackeray once said: 
"If thou hast never been a fool, thou wilt never 
be a wise man," and his words are but a para- 
phrase of the old and true saw, "Errando dis- 
cimius" (We learn by making mistakes). For- 
tunate are they who know how to profit by the 
errors of the past, who will take advantage of 
last year's blunders to steer clear of them, and 
shape their course aright during the year whose 
dawn is nigh. 

With this thought in mind, fully intending 
to benefit by dearly bought knowledge, it is cus- 
tomary for the well-meaning to form good resolu- 
tions at the beginning of the new year. Anent 
this laudable custom, it may be in order to make 
an observation, the truth of which will be con- 
firmed by thousands out of their own experience. 
It is this : that little or no good is likely to come 
of a multitude of resolutions. Some people are 
so constituted that they will readily promise 
anything and everything when the fit is on them, 
or on the impulse of the moment, but frequently 



SS Mere: Hints: Moral and Social. 

the fulfilment falls far short of the promise. They 
remind us of Christ's parable concerning the 
man who ordered his two sons to work in the 
field. The first promised instantly and cheer- 
fully to do the paternal behest, and doubtless in- 
tended to keep his promise; but as a matter of 
fact he failed to keep it. Impulsive, good- 
natured, but fickle, unsteady and thoughtless, he 
soon forgot his plighted word. The other, who 
at first positively refused, but afterward, seized 
with remorse, put in a good day's work, was 
decidedly the more trustworthy of the two. 
When many resolutions are taken they will soon 
be forgotten, or become impossible of fulfilment, 
from their very multiplicity. 

By far the better plan is to imitate the skil- 
ful strategist who brings all his artillery to bear 
on one or two of the most important points, in- 
stead of scattering, and thereby wasting, his 
energies. One solidly good resolve is enough. 
A little self-introspection will show that each of 
us has a radical or root passion — a dominant 
vicious tendency — from which most or all of our 
faults spring as naturally as the branches of the 
tree issue from its trunk. This prevailing pas- 
sion is the seat of the disease; the other failings 
are but the symptoms. It is the cause; the 
others are the effects. And it stands to reason 
that if we really wish to rid ourselves of the 
effects, we must first get rid of the cause. 



Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 89 

[January 5, 19 10.] 

THE GREAT BROTHERHOOD 

WE have ample evidence roundabout us that 
"the brotherhood of men" is not a mere 
empty phrase. The older the world grows, the 
more we become convinced of our interdepend- 
ence one upon another, and the more earnestly 
we desire, and seek to effect, a genuine solidarity, 
in fact, as well as in name. The feeling has its 
primary cause in the very nature of man ; it has 
been emphasized and strengthened by the teach- 
ings of religion, but its present marked develop- 
ment is due, in great measure, to the conditions 
of modern life. Man is by nature a social animal, 
and he recognizes instinctively that it is only 
in conjunction with his kind, that he can hope to 
bring out the best that is in him. Ethics and, 
still more, religion tend to raise the fact to a 
higher plane, stripping it of the purely egotistic 
or selfish, by proclaiming that we have one com- 
mon Father, God, and all men are brethren. 

While, of course, this last is by far the best 
and noblest incentive to human helpfulness, still 
the motive arising from necessity and the nature 
of things is not to be lightly laid aside. It need 
not, and should not, be the sole, or even the 
dominant one, but it is useful as a help. 

As an illustration of human interdependence, 
the reader may remember Aesop's fable of "The 
Belly and the Members," which was once so 
successfully employed by a wise old Roman 



90 Mere: Hints: Moral, and Social. 

statesman to bring the disgruntled plebs to their 
senses. And St. Paul's illustration will appeal 
even more strongly to the Christian. "There are 
many members," he says, "but one body. And 
the eye cannot say to the hand 'I need not thy 
help,' nor again the head to the feet 'I have no 
need of you.' Yea, much more those that seem to 
be the more feeble members of the body, are more 
necessary. * * * And if one member suffer 
anything, all the members suffer with it; or if 
one member glory, all the members rejoice with 
it." 

This truth has never been brought home with 
such force to men as it is in our modern indus- 
trial life, with its highly specialized division of 
labor. A failure in one big branch of industry, 
or a great strike, like the recent strike of the 
Switchmen's Union in the Northwest, affects 
not only one locality, or the one concern directly 
interested, but many others as well. Its action 
is like that of the ripples on the breast of the 
waters, or the vibrating waves of ether, pushing 
on, regardless, to the farthest possible limit. 

The realization of the Fatherhood of God 
and the brotherhood of men is especially evident 
in the gradual passing away of intense and nar- 
row sectionalism, or clannishness. Patriotism is 
still, and will ever continue to be, a virtue, but 
among the thinking element at least, it no longer 
gives rise to the bitter race antagonisms of the 
past. International unions for social, educational, 
and industrial purposes, are becoming more and 
more common. The old scholastic dialecticians 



Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 91 

used to say that an argument is only as strong 
as its weakest premise, and, applying the same 
principle to society, men are coming to realize 
more fully that the body politic is no stronger 
than its weakest part, and that the social or- 
ganism cannot truly be called sound and healthy 
so long as some of its members are diseased. 
And, while we still have with us plenty of the 
selfish tribe, who seek to stifle the promptings of 
charity or philanthropy by asking, like Cain of 
old, "Am I my brother's keeper?" there is, for- 
tunately, a large and ever-growing number of 
men and women keenly alive to a sense of their 
duty toward their brethren. 

We may not have much, or any, wealth to 
spare for the needy, but the giving of alms is 
not the only way to help the cause of humanity. 
There is another, and a better way, one which 
is open to all of us, and one which cannot be 
measured in terms of money, and that way may 
be aptly characterized by the one word — service. 
It may be much, or it may be little, that we can 
do in this line, but whatever the amount, great 
or small, if each one does his share, he is con- 
tributing, in the best sense, to the attainment of 
the ideal human brotherhood. 

[January 12, 19 10.] 

NATURE'S LAW OF COMPENSATION 

IF we remember aright, there is a legend in 
the old Pagan mythology somewhat to this 
effect: The mighty Jove, annoyed by the inces- 



92 Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 

sant murmurings of dissatisfied mortals, appoint- 
ed a day whereon all who had any complaints 
to make should assemble before his throne, dis- 
cuss their grievances, and obtain redress, as far 
as such a thing was possible of attainment, even 
for the great ruler of Olympus. So they all came, 
bringing their various burdens, great and small, 
along with them. It was a sort of general mar- 
ket day; and the king of the gods gave them 
liberty to exchange their burdens as they would. 
But the legend goes on to say that, after compar- 
ing notes, they all returned as they came, carry- 
ing away the same identical burdens, each one 
convinced that, after all, his own was the lightest 
and easiest for him. The moral is obvious. To- 
day, as of yore, each man thinks the other's 
cross lighter than his own, till he attempts to 
lift it, and then he may change his mind. Many 
a one regards himself as the greatest of sufferers 
till he has listened to the outpouring of his 
neighbor's griefs. We have known some to be 
permanently cured of their troubles — even to the 
extent of laughing at themselves — after hearken- 
ing to such recitals. 

There is assuredly such a thing in life as 
a law of compensation. What we lack in some 
respects we usually make up in others, which 
goes to prove that, after all, nature is not so very 
partial in the apportionment of her gifts. He 
who has lost the use of one arm can often do 
double work with the other. Those who are 
wanting in brain force, may have more than their 
due share of brawn, and vice versa. People who 



Mere: Hints: Moral and Social. 93 

are deprived of the use of one of the senses, fre- 
quently have another more than usually well 
developed. Thus the blind have, as a rule, an 
exceptionally keen sense of touch and hearing. 
And by the way, it may be worth mentioning that 
the blind with whom we have been personally 
acquainted have been almost invariably bright 
and cheerful — a fact which has ever been for 
us, one of life's real mysteries. 

The poor sometimes envy the rich; but if 
the whole truth were known, perhaps they are 
far better off in their poverty. It is a truism 
to say that riches do not bring health and con- 
tentment; and certainly these are the most de- 
sirable of human possessions. In this connection 
the reader will probably recall the old story of 
the rich man and the poor who met in a country 
place, in the freshness of early morn, the rich 
man hunting for an appetite, the poor man for 
something to satisfy his. Both had their 
troubles; but which was the worse off? 

Again, as regards the distribution of the big 
and the little ills of life, we think it was Sir 
Walter Scott who observed that those who are 
free from the greater trials, frequently suffer 
much more from the lesser ones — the petty cares 
and vexations that beset their daily path. And 
most of us can vouch for the truth of his re- 
mark. There are people who can bear great 
calamities with fortitude, and yet are completely 
unnerved and upset by things which are in them- 
selves trifling and harmless. 



94 Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 

Touching the things which it is in our power 
to seek or avoid, we find the self-same law in 
operation — the same system of compensation run- 
ning all through life. Nature makes us pay for 
everything we get. If we will insist on dancing, 
we must be ready to "pay the piper." Undue 
merriment is succeeded by a corresponding de- 
pression. The reaction is bound to come. Those 
who have tried the experiment, know to their 
sorrow that "a merry evening maketh a sad morn- 
ing." 

And so we might go on indefinitely, heaping 
up instances to prove that, no matter how uneven 
or unequal things may appear for the time, they 
are pretty evenly balanced in the long run. And 
the true philosopher is the one who is content to 
recognize and accept conditions as they are, and 
try to make the best of them. 



[January ig, 1910.] 



THE BODY SOCIAL AND ITS 
MEMBERS 

GOD never yet made a useless thing. Not one 
of His creatures, however insignificant, but 
has its purpose — even the tiniest insect that 
crawls, and the reptile, and pain, both mental 
and physical. We may not be able to see this, 
on account of our intellectual short-sightedness, 
but nevertheless we must admit it. God's wis- 
dom demands it. And if this is true of inanimate 



Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 95 

things, and the brute creation, it is much more 
true of man. The halt and the blind and the 
palsied, and all the others who are sometimes 
regarded by the materialistic economist as bur- 
dens upon the human race, have their several 
parts to play in the great divine scheme of things. 
The economist's view of usefulness is not the 
only one ; there is a far better and truer one, and 
it is the viewpoint of Almighty God himself. All 
creatures, with the single exception of man, con- 
form by nature to the plan of God. Man alone 
is free, and he uses his freedom at times to get 
out of harmony with God's designs ; for what is 
sin but a lack of harmony with the will of God? 

The proper evolution of man consists in de- 
veloping and perfecting the talents he has, and 
using them to advantage, to accomplish the great- 
est possible amount of good in whatever position 
he may happen to find himself. This is precisely 
what Christ meant when He said : "To him that 
hath, more shall be given, and he shall abound, 
but from him that hath not, even that which 
he hath, shall be taken away." Society has its 
full share of disgruntled characters, who are a 
source of misery to themselves and every one 
round about them. Dissatisfied with their share 
of God's gifts, and their station in life, instead 
of making the best of what they have, and doing 
the work for which they are fitted, they pout 
and sulk, like Achilles in his tent, and refuse to 
work at all. Such an attitude is nothing less 
than a spirit of revolt, unexpressed, indeed, but 
none the less real, against the Almighty. 



06 Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 

These people seem to forget that society, like 
the human body, is a living organism, with head, 
brains, heart, arteries and everything else that 
goes to make up the real man of flesh and blood, 
and that its welfare depends on the harmonious 
working of all its various parts. It is not by 
mere chance or accident that we are fitted for 
certain kinds of work, but rather by design. 
Every creature that God has made has its own 
proper function in the great social organism, 
its own proper place in the divine economy, and 
when it gets out of its natural place, it is as use- 
less as the arm or the leg that is severed from 
the human trunk. When we insist on filling posi- 
tions for which the God of Nature never intended 
us, we must of necessity prove incompetents. 
Clearly all cannot be the head or the brains; 
some must do the less desirable work. And often 
this is precisely the ground of complaint. There 
are not many who care to do the less honorable, 
or the less remunerative, labor. But, after all, 
it is better to be a first-rate cobbler than a third- 
rate lawyer. For those who are influenced by 
considerations of a higher life, the great St. Paul 
assures us (I cor., xii) that, before God, no honest 
labor is menial or ignoble; that the Almighty 
does not look on these things with the eye of 
man; that with Him it is not the part we play, 
but the manner of our playing it, that counts, 
and that the works which men consider menial, 
if done in the proper spirit, are really the most 
honorable in His sight. But even abstracting 
from the higher motives, and measuring things 



Mere: Hints : Moral, and Social,. 97 

by the standard of the here and now, it is de- 
cidedly the part of common sense to content 
ourselves with the work for which we are 
adapted, instead of wasting our time in pining 
and sighing for the impossible or impracticable. 
There is a world of wisdom in the old and oft- 
repeated warning, "Let the shoemaker stick to 
his last." 



[January 26, 19 10.] 

MORAL MOTOR FORCES 

THE true gauge of moral worth is not success, 
but effort. The very word virtue implies 
this, for virtue is something pertaining to the 
vir — the man — or better, to the strong, whether 
male or female. Now and then we hear one re- 
ferred to as negatively good. The distinction be- 
tween negative and positive goodness is, to say 
the least, misleading. In reality there is no such 
thing as negative goodness. There may be a 
marked absence of vicious traits, but this is not 
virtue; and through a misunderstanding of this 
truth, both credit and blame are often placed 
where they are least deserved. Many a one is 
seemingly good, simply because he hasn't courage 
or energy enough to be otherwise, or because 
he lacks the occasion. Until one has been tried 
and proved, it is unwise to put overmuch confi- 
dence in his virtue. On the other hand, some 



98 Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 

are wofully underrated, from a moral stand- 
point, because of our inability to see their trials 
and struggles. 

In moral, as in physical, development growth 
is the law of life. Some appear to grow with 
ease and naturalness ; their course through life 
is like a pleasure trip on a calm and placid lake. 
Others again are continually tempest-tossed on 
the high seas, and not infrequently on the very 
verge of shipwreck. Or, like the weary and foot- 
sore mountain climber, just as they seem to be 
making headway, the foot slips, and down again 
they go. It is rather hard, we must admit. Yet, 
if these climbers are made of the right mettle, 
they won't permit themselves to be daunted by 
failure ; and besides, strange as the assertion may 
appear, if they are doing their best, they are 
really making better progress than those who 
seem to advance without effort. It is not a 
mushroom growth ; it is the slow, but steady and 
sure, growth of the little acorn into the tall and 
sturdy oak. This, of course, is not meant as a 
concession to the weak-kneed, who are ever on 
the alert for pretexts to justify their backslidings, 
but by way of encouragement to those who 
mean to do right, who try to do right, but occa- 
sionally slip and stumble and fall, almost in spite 
of themselves. 

It is common enough to find people who re- 
gard strong passions as a matter of grievance, 
who are thoroughly discouraged by their pres- 
ence, and envy those who are free from them. 
The truth is, they are rather additional motives 



Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 99 

for gratitude. The human passions are not bad, 
but good ; they are sources, not of weakness, but 
of strength ; they are in fact, to our moral nature 
what the fuel is to the furnace, or the steam to 
the engine; they constitute the electric forces 
of morality. The phlegmatic or dispassionate 
man may be amiable and inoffensive enough, but, 
as a rule, he is incapable of great or noble deeds. 
If he is not likely to do any great evil, neither 
is he likely to do any great good. It is easier 
far to lop off surplus energy, than to make the 
plant grow in an uncongenial soil. The men who 
have done the great things of life, have been 
almost invariably men of strong passions ; and 
this is true, not only of the noted characters of 
profane history, but of the sacred chronicles as 
well. To mention one instance out of many, the 
life and writings of the great St. Paul show him 
to have been naturally one of the most passionate 
of men. And when these great souls turned to 
Christ, they did not attempt to stifle their pas- 
sions, but rather to divert them into different 
channels; to use for good ends and aims, the 
energies which they had formerly wasted on 
things evil or indifferent. Mary of Magdala 
did not cease to love after she found the Christ. 
Instead, she gave to Him the heart which, till 
then, had lavished its affections on creatures un- 
worthy of her. 

Whether the passions will prove sources of 
good or evil, depends entirely on the direction 
we give them. Like the great elements — fire, air 
and water — they are capable of becoming man's 



100 Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 

best friends, or his most deadly foe. Subjected 
to law and reason, they are of greatest benefit 
to the individual and society; allowed to run riot, 
they will prove the undoing of both. The spirited 
horse is vastly preferable to the tame and spirit- 
less old nag; but, before he can become really 
serviceable, he needs to be broken and controlled 
by one who knows how. And the human passions 
too, if they are to redound to our credit and wel- 
fare, must first be brought to recognize in us 
their master. 



[February 2, 1910.] 



CONCEIT AND FLIPPANCY BORN OF 
SHALLOWNESS 

"¥ ET knowledge grow from more to more, but 
u more of reverence in us dwell," writes 
Tennyson. Unquestionably, the farther we ad- 
vance in real knowledge, the more reverent we 
shall surely become. Only the sciolist is irrever- 
ent. The true scientist may be, like Darwin, 
Huxley and Spencer, an unbeliever, but he is 
never flippant. The great primal causes of things 
may ever remain for him a sealed book, an in- 
soluble problem, sufficient to keep his judgment 
in suspense, but his science opens up to him a 
realm too vast and wondrous to admit of cock- 
sureness, contemptuous sneering, or irreverence. 
Whatever his private views may be, he knows 
both too much and too little to laugh at opposing 



Mere: Hints: Moral and Social. 101 

beliefs that have anything like a solid foundation 
to rest upon. Tennyson himself held to no dog- 
matic creed, but his poetic insight into the great 
heart of nature ever maintained his mind in an 
attitude of reverential awe, and made him recog- 
nize how infinitesimally small and insignificant 
are our best efforts, and thoughts, and schemes, 
when set side by side with the plans of the mighty 
Architect of the Universe : 



Our little systems have their day, 
They have their day and cease to be ; 
They are but broken lights of Thee, 

And Thou, O Lord, art more than they! 



Francis Bacon has said that a superficial 
knowledge of science may lead men away from 
God, but a thorough study of the same is almost 
certain to bring them back to Him. The eminent 
Louis Pasteur once said : "When one has studied 
much, he returns to the faith of the Breton peas- 
ant, and if I had studied still more, I should 
have the faith of the Breton woman." And, long 
before either of them, Royal David had told us 
that "only the fool saith in his heart: 'There is 
no God.'" 

A sense of humility and reverence is char- 
acteristic of the truly great and deeply learned; 
and wherever we find a conceited mind, or a flip- 
pant, we may be sure that there is shallowness 
behind it : for conceit and flippancy, cocksureness 
and irreverence, are the natural offspring of 
superficiality. Such was the thought in the mind 
of Alexander Pope when he penned the words : 



102 Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 

"A little learning is a dangerous thing. Drink 
deep, or taste not the Pierian spring." 

None, perhaps, is so vain of his attainments, 
as the college boy who has just mastered the 
rudiments of his Latin or Greek grammar. But, 
unless he is a born fool, the farther he advances 
into the vast explored, and yet unexplored, lands 
of knowledge, the more he realizes his short- 
comings, and the conceit is taken out of him. 
The ever-widening and lengthening vista which 
opens up before his eyes, makes him see how 
very little, after all, is his bit of knowledge, com- 
pared with the sum total of things known and 
unknown. It is but an atom in the broad uni- 
verse. If we ever want an opinion expressed, or 
a valuation set, on our darling efforts, literary 
or otherwise, we shall find almost invariably, that 
we will get not only more truth, but likewise 
more mercy and considerateness, from the expert, 
than we could ever hope from the amateur. 

These few suggestions are thrown out in the 
hope that they may prove of practical benefit to 
us in our quest of truth. When looking for light 
and guidance in the great problems of life, it is 
of prime importance that we make choice of none 
but the safest and sanest counselors, of those 
who know thoroughly well what they do know, 
and know, too, their own limitations. The super- 
ficial brilliancy, the ribald jests, the irreverent 
quips, and false, but plausible, reasoning of the 
cocksure, omniscient iconoclast, may be enter- 
taining enough for the nonce, but his very flip- 
pancy and irreverence, his light-fingered and 



Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 103 

light-headed methods of handling such grave 
questions, stamp him as a shallow-brained and 
unsafe guide. The brand of Cain is on his brow. 
Prudence demands that we mark and distrust the 
man who has ever a ready and self-satisfying 
solution of all the mysteries both over and under 
the sun. Better far, and safer far, to follow the 
lead of those who approach the complex problems 
of life in a spirit of reverential awe, with a rea- 
sonable amount of self-diffidence, and who have 
the courage and good sense to say, when occa- 
sion demands : "I do not know." 



[February g, 1910.] 

MENTAL THOROUGHNESS 

IT was not only yesterday that the world be- 
gan to recognize the value of mental thor- 
oughness. Long ago the saying "Timeo hominem 
unius libri" ("I fear the man of one book") had 
taken its place among the near-axioms of the 
Latin tongue. True, the saying admits of more 
than one meaning, and it is sometimes claimed 
that its author feared the man of one book be- 
cause he is likely to be also one-sided and nar- 
row. But this is rather the exception than the 
rule ; it is due to a kink in the brain rather than 
to the methods employed. For, while the spe- 
cialist makes his chosen branch of knowledge 
the beginning and end of his labors, yet his 
specialty necessarily carries him into other fields 



HU Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 

bordering upon his own. The obvious meaning 
of the man who coined the phrase seems to be, 
that he feared to encounter the specialist because 
of his greater proficiency, or expertness, in his 
own particular line of thought. And to bolster 
up our interpretation, we have the other famous 
old Latin saw "Non mult a, sed multu<m" — not a 
mere surface knowledge of a great variety of 
subjects, but a deep and thorough knowledge of 
a few, or even one. In short, with the ancients 
it was not quantity, but quality, that counted ; 
not numbers, but thoroughness. Of course, the 
wider our range of information, the better 
equipped we are for life's struggle; but as we 
have only a limited supply of brain force, we 
cannot hope to master all, and the next best 
thing is to get a thorough grasp of some one 
at least. In this connection we may aptly apply- 
the words of Emerson: "The one prudence of 
life is concentration." 

It is precisely this lack of mental thorough- 
ness that gives rise to so many unnecessary and 
utterly useless controversies, which serve only 
to embitter the opposing parties, and leave the 
hearers as badly muddled at the finish, as they 
were at the start, if not more so. Cardinal New- 
man writes : "How many disputes we have 
listened to, that were interminable, simply be- 
cause the disputants understood neither them- 
selves nor each other !" It is not at all rare to find 
men contending fiercely over subjects upon which 
they are at bottom agreed. Their difference is in 
reality but a matter of words, arising from the 



Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 105 

use of different, and apparently opposite, terms 
to express the same idea, or the same term for 
things entirely different. Such a thing is not 
likely to occur in discussions between men of 
thorough mental training; they are too logical, 
exact, and accurate, for that sort of thing. It was 
this consideration that led Socrates of old to say, 
that if he could find a man able to define and 
divide accurately, he would gladly follow him to 
the ends of the earth. 

It follows from this, that educational systems 
which aim at "cramming," rather than thorough- 
ness, are radically wrong. It is not the purpose 
of education to cover the whole field of human 
thought and endeavor, but to instil sound prin- 
ciples of thought and action, and to supply 
methods. It will not take the shrewd observer 
long to note the difference between the products 
of the two systems — the wrong and the right — 
between the shallow and the thorough man. The 
jack-of-all-trades and master of none, the walk- 
ing encyclopedia, may be a shining meteor for 
a brief space, but pin him down to logic and 
accuracy, and he flounders hopelessly. The thor- 
ough man may not be very brilliant on the sur- 
face, he may even be somewhat slow, but he is 
steady, safe, and sure to pan out better in the 
long run. He is the type that men feel they can 
trust. 

While the value of thoroughness is not a re- 
cent discovery, it is true that now, more than 
ever, it has become an indispensable condition of 
success. In this age of specialization, there is 



106 Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 

no room for the dilettante (unless, perhaps, as 
an ornament of "high society"). Only the man 
born heir to millions can afford to skim the sur- 
face. Those who aim at distinction, or even 
moderate success, must know how to do some 
one thing well; and to do that, they must direct 
all their researches to the end they have in view. 
It must be to them the alpha and the omega, 
the center to which all lines converge. Desultory 
study and reading may be good enough as a 
form of recreation or amusement, but is not like- 
ly to prove of any great practical benefit. What 
Carlyle says of life in general, we may well say 
of the intellectual life in particular: "The man 
without a purpose is like a ship without a rud- 
der — a waif, a nothing, a no man." 



[February 16, 19 10.] 

DR. JEKYLL AND MR. HYDE 

IN everything that came from the pen of Robert 
Louis Stevenson, the observant reader is 
aware that the author has a moral lesson to 
inculcate. This is particularly true of the work 
whose title forms our present caption. "Dr. 
Jekyll and Mr. Hyde" is^the old, world story of 
good and evil striving for the mastery of the 
human heart; it is the conflict ceaselessly going 
on within us between our better and our worse 
self, between spirit and matter, reason and pas- 



Mkrk Hints: Moral and Social. 107 

sion, the angel and the brute. It was the con- 
sciousness of this struggle that made the old pagan 
philosopher exclaim : "I see and approve the bet- 
ter course, but follow after the worse !" It would 
be difficult to find a more vivid description, than 
St. Paul's pen picture of the fierce battle between 
the elements that go to make up what Stevenson 
terms man's dual nature. It is a picture drawn 
not from hearsay, but from the memory of the 
Apostle's own bitter experience: "To will good 
is present with me, but to accomplish what is 
good, I find not. For the good which I will, I 
do not; but the evil which I hate, that I do. I 
am delighted with the law of God according to 
the inward man. But I see another law in my 
members fighting against the law of my mind." 
And from the depths of the agony caused by 
this continuous, and at times seemingly unequal, 
struggle, he cries out: "Unhappy man that I 
am, who shall deliver me from this body of 
death?" 

Assuredly there is a Dr. Jekyll and a Mr. 
Hyde in each and every one of us — the Jekyll 
part of us tending upward, the sinister Hyde 
well content to remain on the brute level. Many 
a man is Dr. Jekyll to the outside world, and the 
odious, monstrous Hyde, in his own home circle. 
Many there are who show the Jekyll side clev- 
erly enough in church on Sunday, and with Hyde- 
like heartlessness, bleed the poor, the widow, and 
the orphan, during the rest of the week. As some 
one has well expressed it: "They are ready to 
offer their prayers on Sunday, if on Monday they 



108 Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 

may go into the market place, and skin their fel- 
lows and sell their hides." 

Dr. Jekyll is a good man, a benevolent and a 
lovable man, and so are we all when we follow 
the promptings of our better nature: when rea- 
son, or conscience, holds sway over the unruly 
passions. But when it wearies for a while of the 
bitter strife, and loosens its grip on the reins, 
the unchecked animal, Hyde, goes bounding forth 
on his career of license. The pampered children 
of luxury may smile, with mingled feelings of 
contempt and pity, at the policy of the old 
ascetics, but in that, they only manifest their own 
want of sense. For, after all, the ascetics are 
very wise men, from a philosophical, as well as 
from a religious, point of view. They realize that 
the passions are to the reason what the horse 
is to the rider, and that, if they would retain 
the mastery, they must occasionally use the bit 
and the spur. If they are somewhat stern in 
dealing with the brute element of their nature, it 
is not out of hatred, but with a view to its own 
ultimate best interests. It is because they love 
it wisely and well. They are following the 
practice of St. Paul, who tells us that he chastised 
his body, for the purpose of bringing it into sub- 
jection. 

The end and aim of both civilization and reli- 
gion is nothing more or less than to establish 
and maintain an equilibrium between these two 
opposing forces — reason and passion. Civiliza- 
tion is not measured by wealth and luxury, or 
even by the prevalence of book learning; for men- 



Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 109 

tal culture may co-exist with the grossest animal- 
ism. It is not unusual to hear of born savages, 
who have been reared in the lap of science and 
luxury, hearkening to the call of the wild, and 
returning to the barbarous customs of their for- 
bears. No reputable authority on ethics has ever 
yet defined civilization as a state in which electri- 
cal appliances, aeroplanes, railroads, Dread- 
noughts, and magnificent buildings, abound. One 
and all, they tell us rather that it is the dom- 
inance of reason over passion. 

Eternal self-restraint is the price of success, 
in the struggle between Jekyll and Hyde. Every 
unlawful indulgence granted the passions 
strengthens them, and withdraws them farther 
beyond our control. It is far easier to change 
from Jekyll to Hyde, than from Hyde to Jekyll, 
and if we repeatedly indulge the Hyde craving, it 
is probable that we will one day reach a stage 
whence return will be next to impossible. Those 
who have read Stevenson's story know that poor. 
Dr. Jekyll tried it once too often. And so may 
we. 



[February 29, 19 10.] 

IS HONESTY THE BEST "POLICY?" 

" Jk N honest man's the noblest work of God." 
Jlm, Aye, verily he is, and pity 'tis, that this 
noblest of God's works is not very much more 
in evidence. It is not a question here of common 
honesty in matters of justice, for we are opti- 



110 Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 

mistic enough to believe that honest men, in 
that sense, are not so rare. We speak rather 
(after the mind of the poet) of all-round honest 
men, of thoroughly just, truthful, and candid 
men — open and above-board, both in deed and 
expression; in brief, our theme is of men who 
seem just what they are, and are just what they 
seem. 

True, this uniform honesty does not always 
pay, from a financial or a social point of view, 
and the man who seeks such a reward for his 
honesty may be sorely disappointed. The 
Wednesday articles of the past month or so, 
emphasize the truth of Longfellow's remark, that 
"things are not" always "what they seem." And 
yet most people — or, anyhow, a very large pro- 
portion — judge solely by the seeming. Their 
estimates and appreciations are often based on 
appearance, instead of reality. And so it fre- 
quently happens that the sham makes a far better 
impression than the honest man ; for the sham 
carries his good points on the surface, while those 
of the honest man may be hidden in the depths. 
The very honesty of a man will make him scorn 
to exhibit his good traits, while the parading of 
the virtues he has, and the counterfeiting of others 
he has not, make up the very life of the sham. 

They say that "honesty is the best 'policy,' " 
and the saying is generally accepted as true. 
No doubt in the long run honesty is best. It 
isn't the real sense of the saw, but the somewhat 
equivocal wording, that makes us pause — it's the 
"policy" part that sets us thinking. Is honesty, 



Mer£ Hints: Moral and Social. Ill 

after all, the "best policy?" In point of fact, 
do sensible men ever adopt it merely as a matter 
of policy? Certainly it does not, as a rule, tend 
to make one either rich or popular. That it is an 
unfailing commercial help — especially in view of 
modern industrial conditions — may be reasonably 
called in question; and while we would not, for 
the world, be unjust to any definite individual, 
we cannot refrain from dropping the almost need- 
less remark that it is not always the downright 
honest men who succeed in amassing the millions. 
(Verbum sat sapienti.) In the matter of competi- 
tion, the unscrupulous merchant has, far and 
away, the advantage over the honest man of busi- 
ness, and with a little native shrewdness, the 
game of commercial sleight-of-hand may be long 
drawn out, without any great fear of detection. 
And as regards the social side, honesty doesn't 
seem to be a whit more profitable. It won't do 
at all for the professional politician ; it would 
prove his undoing, in very short order. It would 
never do for the diplomat, or the typical society 
man, or any other whose chief aim is to please, 
or curry favor. The popularity hunter can't afford 
to be honest. He must have the glad hand, and 
the warm grasp, and the deceitful smile, or the 
affected horse laugh, for all alike, mean and 
noble, bad and good. Whatever may be the feel- 
ing of contempt lurking deep down in his heart, 
he must perforce greet everyone who can be of 
use to him, as a friend and brother. 

But whither does all this lead? the reader 
may well ask. What is the drift of it? Is it 



112 Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 

meant to imply that honesty and success are in- 
compatible? Decidedly no; for facts innumer- 
able prove the contrary. It does mean, though, 
that honesty does not necessarily, or unvaryingly, 
bring success in its wake, and that, if honesty is 
to take root and thrive, it must be in a more 
fertile soil than mere policy or expediency. Hon- 
esty js its own reward. It may not be best as a 
"policy," and it is wrong to regard it as such. 
It may not add much to our wealth or popularity, 
but it is worth infinitely more to us than gold 
or fame. It is against the danger of viewing 
honesty as a worldly-wise "policy," that we would 
sound an alarm; for those who practise it in that 
spirit, without any higher motive, not finding it 
quite what they expected, but rather financially 
unprofitable and impolitic, are not unlikely to end 
by throwing it overboard, and making a complete 
wreck of it. 



[March 3, 19 10.] 



MORE ANENT HONEST MEN AND 
SHAMS 

A WELL-KNOWN circus man once declared 
that the people like to be humbugged, and 
when we think of the success attained by so 
many adepts in the art of bluffing, his dictum 
seems to contain more than a modicum of truth. 
Let a man put on a bold front and give out as 
gospel truth something the public wants to be- 
lieve, and he is pretty sure of a favorable hear- 



Mdre; Hints: Moral and Social. 113 

ing. The valgus generally gives ready credence 
to the clever and brazen sham. Carried away by 
an overwhelming wave of enthusiasm, without 
stopping to demand solid and substantial proofs, 
it acts first and thinks later. History, both writ- 
ten and unwritten, contains numerous instances 
of this public gullibility — some of very recent 
date. The cause and the remedy are, or ought 
to be, quite obvious. The success of the colossal 
humbug is due to our slipshod and haphazard 
acceptance of unverified statements ; and our 
past embarrassing experiences in that line should 
make us, not unreasonably suspicious, but a little 
more desirous of getting below the surface, and 
sifting the wheat of plain, unvarnished truth 
from the chaff of downright lying and insincerity. 
In the little things of life, as well as the big- 
ger ones, we are not infrequently "taken in," 
betrayed and humbugged by the plausible and 
smooth-tongued sham. Tennyson has said that 
"words, like nature, half reveal and half conceal 
the soul within." He meant, of course, that all 
spoken language is imperfect, and inadequate to 
express our deepest thoughts and emotions. But 
his assertion is doubly true of the sham, who de- 
liberately employs speech, not to discover, but 
rather to hide, his real meaning. Half truths, 
skilful evasions, cant, equivocations, and lying 
compliments, are his political and social capital. 
To those who can see through the typical, pro- 
fessional sham, there is scarcely in existence a 
more disgusting thing. It should not be difficult 
to conjure up a mental image of the creature. 



114 Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 

He is found in all walks of life, and is in all sub- 
stantially the same detestable specimen of the 
Pecksniff variety. He makes himself all things 
to all men, to gain all for himself. He can be 
readily recognized by his pious cant, and his 
feigned sympathy, and his blatant professions of 
zeal for the interests of those who may be of 
use to him. He seems to feel that unless he con- 
tinues professing, and excusing, and disclosing 
his exalted motives, the foundationless structure 
of his reputation will totter and fall. As for the 
genuinely honest man, who has his faults and 
knows and admits them,' he must at times be 
almost green with envy on beholding the self- 
satisfied sham, who is never at fault, or, if he be 
now and then apparently in the wrong, it is only 
apparently, because his purposes or intentions 
were so good, so noble ! All honor to honest 
Carlyle with his manly hatred of shams and 
shamming. He may have occasionally mistaken 
honest men for shams, but of the soundness of 
his principles there can be no doubt. 

And yet, in spite of our just and natural loath- 
ing for the sham, he often prospers where the 
honest man fails. There are legions who are 
unable, or who won't take the trouble, to distin- 
guish between the genuine and the spurious, be- 
tween honesty and sham. Flattery is sweet to most 
people, even when they know it is flattery. The 
honest man says what he means and means what 
he says. He is not given to flattery or empty, 
and still less lying, compliments. He sticks 
to the bald and naked truth, and the truth some- 



Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 115 

times hurt and rankles. Though he is not neces- 
sarily brutal, he may easily appear so to those 
whom the shoe pinches. Wounded susceptibility 
or vanity is apt to regard him as rude, uncouth, 
boorish, and unfit for polite and cultured society. 
Social ostracism is not uncommonly the meed 
of thoroughgoing honesty, and certainly society 
is none the better off for such shabby treatment 
of honest, upright dealing. The poor opinion of 
the unthinking means little or nothing to the 
honest man. The loss is society's, not his. His 
consciousness of right, and proper self-respect, 
will more than make amends for the lack of 
vulgar approval or applause. 

If sterling honesty is not more easily recog- 
nized and better appreciated by many of us, it is 
because our methods of measuring moral worth 
are wrong. A sense of justice and fair play, and 
a love of truth, would suggest that we change the 
standard — that we base our estimate of character, 
not on honeyed words, or oily manners, or super- 
ficial accomplishments, but that, brushing aside 
mere accidents and appearances, and digging 
beneath the surface, we get at the substance, at 
the real man within. The gold-plated ornament 
may be fairer far to the eye than the rich un- 
washed nugget of gold, but when it comes to a 
question of choice, only the veriest simpleton 
would prefer the shining, pretty, but compara- 
tively cheap, thing to the plain, but rich, gold 
nugget. 



116 Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 
[March 9, 19 10.] 

THE POWER OF ASSOCIATIONS 

HUMAN character is shaped largely by the 
persons and events that enter into our 
lives. Great events influence us, but great per- 
sonages influence us still more — with their living 
voice and look, and the living soul breathing 
and shining through them. We are continually 
influencing others, and being in turn influenced 
by them. In this respect the moral, like the 
physical, life is a veritable series of chemical ac- 
tions and reactions. Professor Drummond aptly 
characterizes the process as "the alchemy of in- 
fluence." There is nothing at all strained or far- 
fetched in ascribing hypnotism itself to the in- 
fluence of a strong mind or will over a weaker. 
And, though it is but seldom that these influ- 
ences reach the hypnotic stage, it is safe to say 
that most persons with whom we associate for 
any notable length of time leave their impress 
on us for good or evil. The stronger the char- 
acter, the more we find to admire in it, the 
greater, of course, is the influence. The bio- 
graphies of eminent men show clearly that their 
mental and moral development has been largely 
influenced by their early, and sometimes by 
their later, associations. Though long-time 
bosom friends or boon companions may, and 
often do, differ in regard to minor details, we 
usually find them in accord on all essentials. So, 
too, with husbands and wives who are well mated 



Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 117 

and congenial, and who have for many years 
traveled up life's steep hill together. As time 
rolls on, they become more and more alike in 
their habits, their mode of life, their way of 
looking at things — in short, in a general trend 
of thought and character. It is the influence, 
conscious or unconscious, which each exerts upon 
the other. 

We speak of those who have the faculty of 
attracting or influencing others as being endowed 
with personal magnetism. But there is a relative, 
as well as an absolute, personal magnetism ; and 
there are comparatively few who do not wield 
some influence for w r eal or woe, at least within 
their own little circle. Their power may be con- 
fined within very narrow limits, but it means 
as much to those who are under its sway, as 
greater influence does in wider spheres. If this 
magnetic influence be elevating, needless to re- 
mark, it behooves us to keep well within its area. 
If, on the contrary, it prove sinister or baleful, it 
is of momentous importance that we withdraw 
ourselves far beyond its range. Of course, our 
associations are not always of our making ; some- 
times they are forced and unavoidable. But 
where a choice is possible, too much stress cannot 
be laid on the necessity of prudence and discern- 
ment in making it. While this is particularly 
true of the young, it is not without its bearing 
on their elders. Old and young, we are all sub- 
ject to these influences; and the misfortune of 
it all is that the evil influences are usually quicker 
in action, and more effective, than the good. 



118 Mi-re Hints: Moral and Social. 

The Chinese have a very apt proverb to express 
the ease with which evil outstrips good in the 
race for the mastery of man's heart. "Error 
travels around the world," they say, "while truth 
is putting on her boots." 

One may be good enough at the time of his 
entrance into evil companionship, but sooner 
or later, his connections are bound to tell on him. 
It is almost a truism to say that "evil communi- 
cations corrupt good morals," or that "a man 
may be known by the company he keeps." And 
all who have a proper regard for their own 
moral life, and the welfare of those intrusted to 
their care, will be as wary of evil associations 
as they are of infectious diseases — and even more 
so, inasmuch as the moral well-being is of far 
greater moment than that of the body. 



[March 16, ig 10.] 

SLANDEROUS TONGUES 

IT HAS been well and truly said that "the pen 
is mightier than the sword," and the saying 
applies even more forcibly to the human tongue, 
which was very much in evidence, and had 
wrought a w T orld of good and evil — of blessing 
and cursing — many cycles ere pen and ink were 
known. It is the tongue of the eloquent orator 
and enthusiast that has, in all ages, incited men 
to deeds of wondrous daring and heroism; and 
it is the tongue, too, of fiery marplots and dem- 



Mere: Hints: Moral, and Social,. 119 

agogues, that has led to the most disastrous up- 
heavals in the world's history. But we need not 
betake ourselves to the chronicles of old to form 
an idea of its power for weal or woe, or to find 
traces of the ruin it has caused. We have all 
the evidence we want at our very doors. Who, 
among us, with even a very limited experience, 
can be ignorant of the havoc wrought by the vile 
tongue of the slanderer — of the fair reputations 
it has blighted, the promising careers it has 
blasted, the brilliant prospects it has ruined? 
How many are the happy homes it has wrecked, 
and the loving hearts it has torn apart and 
crushed beneath its merciless iron heel ! 

The simple lie, which hurts only the liar 
himself, is bad enough, for "lying lips are an 
abomination" not only "to the Lord," but to every 
decent man and woman as well. The charge of 
untruthfulness is one which even the child re- 
sents with all his might. He may stand a great 
deal of bantering, but if he has a spark of self- 
respect in his make-up there is one taunt which 
his young spirit will not brook. Call him a liar, 
and he is up in arms at once. There is some- 
thing so indescribably mean about lying that the 
veriest stripling seems to feel it instinctively from 
the moment he begins to reason. But if simple 
lying is bad, the two-edged sword of slander, 
which wounds both accuser and accused, is im- 
measurably worse — worse, in some respects, than 
theft and murder. For it is the theft and murder 
of that which people of honor and spirit prize 
far more highly than money, or even life itself. 



120 Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 

In the category of crime there are few acts to 
compare, in baseness and malice, with deliberate, 
cold-blooded calumny. The Founder of Chris- 
tianity was exceptionally lenient with most 
classes of sinners, but the slanderer formed an 
exception to the general rule. In fact, almost the 
only instances of His indulgence in bitter in- 
vective, are His references to the libelous 
Pharisees, who were constantly misrepresenting 
Himself and His work. 

Perhaps one of the strongest chapters in all 
literature is St. James' indictment of the un- 
bridled tongue. The writer evidently felt deeply 
on the subject, and knew from experience the 
truth of the words he penned: "Behold how 
small a fire kindleth a great wood ! And the 
tongue is a fire — a world of iniquity * * * be- 
ing set on fire by hell." Man has succeeded in 
taming all sorts of beasts and birds, but there 
is one little force which still remains untamed 
and unsubdued — the venomous tongue, a restless 
evil, full of deadly poison. In the matter of libel, 
as in most other things, destruction is easier 
than construction. It is far easier to pull down 
and destroy a reputation, than it is to build it 
up again. And yet, build it up again the de- 
stroyer must, if he would square himself with 
justice. There is no alternative. No amount of 
money will compensate for the loss of one's good 
name. Nothing short of complete vindication 
will suffice to right the wrong, and clear the de- 
famer in the High Court of Justice. 



Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 121 

[March 23, 19 10.] 

WOMAN'S POWER FOR GOOD 

SORRY wights there are — a few — who would 
argue from the time and manner of Eve's 
creation, that woman was an afterthought in the 
mind of the Almighty. We would rather believe 
that the Lord purposely delayed her introduc- 
tion to make Adam appreciate her all the more, 
after the trying experience of his loneliness and 
incompleteness. For, despite his exceptional 
gifts of body and mind, until her coming he was 
but half a man. What a pathetic figure he must 
have cut in Eden's beauteous domain, beholding, 
wherever he turned, the happiness of the mated 
birds and beasts — he alone of all God's creatures 
without a partner like himself. 

The first woman certainly owed something 
to man, but ever since, man has been the debtor. 
He gets far more than he gives. There isn't a 
man in his sober senses who doesn't realize this 
indebtedness. Whatever good there is in us, is 
due in great measure, to the noble women who 
influence our lives. Nor is there a man on whom 
the influence of a good woman is wholly lost. 
It may not be immediately evident, but it is 
bound to tell in the long run. Woman's role in 
human progress — in civilizing and humanizing 
the race — is by no means second to that of man. 
It may be less showy or apparent, but it is none 
the less real and important. Hers is the funda- 
mental work, and, if the whole truth were known, 
many of the great deeds for which men get credit 



122 Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 

are primarily due to their self-effacing helpmeets. 
Every student of history knows this and could 
give, off-hand, abundant proofs of our contention. 

In private and public life, on the individual 
as on the body social, her influence is greater far 
than appears at first blush. She herself may 
not be conscious of it, but she is the real power 
behind the throne. Barrie's "What Every 
Woman Knows" shows cleverly, and with per- 
fect truth, how woman often does the work that 
really counts, pulls the strings, and sets the ma- 
chinery in motion, with little credit from the 
beneficiary, who, in his blindness and conceit, 
thinks he is "it." In storm and stress and sick- 
ness, in sorrow and failure, it is to woman's in- 
spirations, to her kindly heart and skilful hand, 
that man turns for counsel and relief. So long 
as woman keeps within her own proper sphere, 
her power for good is almost beyond the range 
of calculation. She has in her hands the making 
and molding of the future voters and officials 
of the land. Their moral training is largely 
hers, and whatever tends to the child's moral 
betterment, certainly makes for good citizenship. 

It isn't however, by antagonizing man that 
woman will best succeed in attaining her destiny, 
but rather by a hearty co-operation with him. 
So God and Nature intended, and so it must be. 
It is useless to kick against the goad. The Al- 
mighty made us what we are, and we can't un- 
make ourselves. Gracefully or gracelessly, we 
must perforce submit. Man has his mission and 
woman has hers, and it is not by clashing that 



Mere: Hints: Moral and Social. 123 

either will accomplish anything worth while. 
The secret of success is a skilful union of forces 
working together in harmony and love for the 
common good. 

Just a word about the other side of the pic- 
ture. If there is anything on God's earth more 
disgusting than an effeminate man, it is surely 
a mannish woman. The Amazons of the French 
Revolution have shown us the depths of fury 
and heartlessness to which the unsexed woman 
can descend. The power of the womanly woman 
for good is equaled only by that of the unwoman- 
ly woman for evil. Again, in speaking of 
woman's influence for good, we are not referring 
to the butterfly type, the vain and frivolous 
woman whose ideals never rise higher than dress 
and pleasure, or the girl whose smattering of 
the arts and tongues and sciences makes her 
ashamed of the parents who stinted themselves 
to give her the little her brains are capable of 
holding. The animated doll may be pleasant 
enough to look at, or useful as a piece of house- 
hold furniture, but from the standpoint of good 
influence, she is decidedly a minus quantity. 

We are not so sure that the world has any 
need of the ''new woman" as she is commonly 
understood. The old-fashioned, sensible, woman- 
ly woman of bygone generations was good 
enough for the Creator's plans, and taken all in 
all, it is extremely unlikely that she can ever 
'be improved upon. 



1*24 Mkrk Hints: Moral and Social. 
[March so, 19 10.] 

SELF-APPOINTED JUDGES 

FEW, if any, of us get our just deserts in 
this life. In nearly every instance it is a 
case of over-praise or over-censure. Passion, 
bias, prejudice, are usually too strong to admit 
of an impartial judgment. In forming our esti- 
mates, the factors of love and hate are far more 
potent than truth and justice. When there is 
question of a friend, we often wilfully blind our- 
selves to his evil side and see only the good. Or, 
if we can't close our eyes to the bad, at least we 
manage to put the best possible construction on 
his intentions. On the contrary, if the subject 
under discussion be an enemy, or one for whom 
we have an aversion, our methods are just the 
reverse. We can see no good in him; or if the 
good is too manifest to be denied with any show 
of reason, we proceed to question his motives. 
It is the same old gag adopted by Christ's ene- 
mies in the matter of casting out devils. The 
facts were patent to all. But, said the libelous 
Pharisees, He has an understanding with Satan 
himself — He is in league with him; "He casteth 
out devils by Beelzebub, the prince of devils." 

So long as we maintain one standard for 
friends, and another for foes, so long as we rest 
content with shallow and superficial judgments, 
so long will men fail to get the verdict they de- 
serve; it will be ever either too lenient or too 
harsh. The world at large, as well as its jails, 
is full of the victims of circumstantial evidence. 



Mere; Hints: Moral and Social. 125 

It is the comparative few (if any) who are 
properly labeled. We pass by the rough diamond 
as of little or no account, and treasure the glit- 
tering gewgaws. The world flouts some of its 
greatest heroes while living, and erects noble 
monuments to them when their eyes and ears are 
closed to the sights and sounds of popular ap- 
plause. It strains to its bosom, and clasps in 
fond embrace, the sleek and fawning hypocrite 
only to find out all too late that it has been 
cherishing a viper. As the late Father Tabb so 
charmingly puts it : 

Their noonday never knows 
What names immortal are. 
Tis night alone that shows 
How star surpasseth star. 

There is no blame attaching to man for the 
fallibility of his judgments. They can't be other- 
wise than fallible or defective, since he has not 
the proper data to work on. But the very fact 
that our human judgments are so fallible, should 
at least make us a little more modest and diffi- 
dent, and induce us to form our opinions more 
slowly and cautiously. Some must of necessity 
pass judgment on others — their position demands 
it. And all that can reasonably be expected of 
such is that, in forming their judgment, they 
make the best use of the materials at hand, and 
strive to be just and impartial. But for him 
who undertakes to decide without authority or 
competency, there is no valid excuse. If he be 
a Christian, his religion will tell him as much. 
The gentle Christ was rather severe on self-con- 



126 Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 

stituted judges: "Judge not that you may not be 
judged; for with what measure you mete, it shall 
be meted to you. * * * Judge not before the 
time. * * * There is One that judgeth," etc. 
Nor were His apostles a bit more lenient: "Who 
are thou that judgest another man's servant? 
To his own master he standeth or falleth. Where- 
in thou judgest another, thou condemnest thy- 
self." 

Life is hard enough at its best, without trying 
to make it unendurable by picking out micro- 
scopic flaws in the lives of our associates. And, 
unless grave public or private interests are at 
stake, the principles of human brotherhood de- 
mand that we put the best possible interpreta- 
tion on the conduct and motives of our fellow- 
men. True, there are exceptions. Duty — a re- 
gard for the well-being of society at large — may 
sometimes compel the ministers of justice to in- 
cline to suspicion and severity. But, as a rule, 
when the arguments for and against are equally 
good and strong, why not apply legal methods, 
and give the accused the benefit of the doubt? 



[April 6, 19 io.] 

MORAL BACKBONE 

MORAL courage deserves its monuments, no 
less than physical prowess. There is no 
lack of tributes to the latter, but the former is 
not so well cared for. Yet, of the two, moral 
courage is unquestionably the more worthy of 



Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 127 

esteem. It requires greater strength of character 
and more self-sacrifice than does physical bravery. 
There is many a one less afraid of swords and bul- 
lets than of adverse public opinion, or the loss of 
friends. Everybody admires the fearless soldier. 
There is a certain eclat about him and his deeds 
that goes far to compensate the spirited and 
fame-loving man for his sacrifices, and seems to 
make it worth his while to risk even a life. But 
everybody does not always admire and, still 
less, love, the man of strong, moral backbone. 
Those whom he antagonizes — and they are nec- 
essarily many — are likely to bear anything but 
good-will toward him. Not his the shining halo 
that surrounds the head of the brave son of Mars. 
And yet, to express fearlessly one's honest con- 
victions, when there is nothing to gain but every- 
thing to lose thereby; to stand up for them, and 
fight for them, with friend and foe alike; to be- 
come willingly, for their sakes, the prey of malig- 
nant tongues; to forego popularity, and, if need 
be, sacrifice his very friends, for what he holds 
to be right and just, is assuredly something more 
genuinely heroic than risking one's life on the 
glorious field of battle. To espouse a popular 
and winning cause is no great feat, but to stand 
up boldly for justice and truth when power and 
pelf are arrayed against them — that is the act of 
a man. In attempting to give due credit to the 
morally courageous we don't, of course, include 
the ever "consistent" man, if by "consistency" is 
meant ignorant self-opinionatedness, bull-headed- 
ness, or unreasoning obstinacy — and frequently 



128 MERE Hints: Moral and Social. 

that is just what is meant. Only the fool never 
changes his mind. The wise are ever the first to 
recognize and rectify a mistake, when it is pointed 
out to them. And they lose nothing thereby. 
The very best of men, and the most honest, have 
changed sides and beliefs, and the sensible people 
of the world thought none the less of them for it. 
It is the weak, timid, changing expression of an 
unchanged belief, the cowardly veering or back- 
sliding, due to fear or influence, that merits cen- 
sure. There may not be much in the way of 
glare or glitter about the man who braves the 
anger of his associates, in defense of his neigh- 
bor's good name, yet many a one whom no 
bodily peril can stop or stay, will balk at speak- 
ing out his mind when his fellow-man's reputa- 
tion is being torn to tatters by the foul, en- 
venomed shafts of calumny. 

In what we have said, there is no wish to de- 
parage martial ardor or prowess. Nor is there 
any danger that we could do so even if we would. 
It is not that we admire physical .courage less, 
but that we love moral courage still more. If we 
were as lavish in our recognition of moral back- 
bone, as we are in raising shafts to the memories 
of famous soldiers, and conspicuous examples of 
material benefactions, it would perhaps go far 
toward implanting and fostering in the rising 
generation a better than Spartan spirit — a love 
and appreciation of the quality most deserving 
of their admiration and imitation, a quality emi- 
nently conducive to the very best type of good 
citizenship. If this truth were duly emphasized 



Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 129 

and impressed upon the youthful mind in the 
classroom, it would do more, both for the state 
and the individual, than all the ologies — with due 
respect to them — that were ever dreamed of. 
Even were this the only result of childhood's 
training, it would be something well worth while, 
and if the lesson were taken to heart, and put in 
practice, it would do away with the painful ne- 
cessity of keeping everlasting tab on the chosen 
guardians of the public interests, and literally 
forcing them, by fear of material or political 
losses, to do their bounden and sworn duty. 



[April 13, 19 10.] 

THE SACREDNESS OF AN OATH 

SHOULD the day ever come, when the solemn 
oath calling upon God to witness the truth 
of what we say or promise, will be lightly re- 
garded by the generality of men, it will be the 
day that sounds the death-knell of all human 
faith and trust. The oath is the highest tribunal 
of conscience — its court of last appeal. For the 
man who realizes thoroughly what it means, and 
really believes in a God, it is something supreme- 
ly awe-inspiring; and nothing short of duty, or 
direst need, or, at least, the most justifiable 
utility, could induce him to take it. He uses it 
not as an ordinary, everyday confirmation of his 
good faith, but only as a last resort. If his oath 



130 Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 

won't suffice to hold him to the truth, assuredly 
nothing else will. His case is truly hopeless; 
no confidence can be placed in him. 

The oath is, in truth, nothing less than sum- 
moning the Omnipotent God into court, to serve 
as a pledge or security for our good faith. It 
is a bold enough venture even when we feel that 
we have justice and right on our side; and how 
can we fittingly characterize the act of one who 
dares to call on the name of the Almighty to 
sanction an injustice or to witness a lie? To 
make an equal — a fellow-man — a party to such an 
infamous proceeding, would be justly considered 
one of the most grievous wrongs we could inflict 
upon him; to treat a friend thus, is one of the 
meanest and foulest acts of treachery, and it is 
well-nigh impossible to conceive how even the 
most depraved could have the hardihood to at- 
tempt such trickery with his Maker. 

The oath, then, is the strongest and last sur- 
viving safeguard of human truth and justice, of 
human faith and trust; and if that last, strong 
bulwark ever fails us, then will surely come 
the deluge. And yet, in spite of its awful sacred- 
ness, we have ample evidence from many quarters 
that the oath is treated very frequently with but 
scant respect, and that, too, by people who claim 
to believe firmly in God and His justice. The 
saloonkeeper who violates his oath by selling 
on Sunday, or to minors, would likely resent, with 
some force, the charge of insulting the Almighty. 
He will try to justify himself on the plea that 
his promise is a mere matter of form, extorted 



Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 131 

from him — compulsory, hence not binding. So, 
too, the saloonkeeper's Sunday customer will 
often deny under oath the fact of his getting 
liquor, and seems to think that charity or friend- 
ship will excuse, if not sanctify, his perjury. 
Witnesses in other criminal and civil court cases 
sometimes act similarly, and perhaps for the same 
reasons as the foregoing. And as regards office- 
holders unmindful of their sworn oaths, we all 
know their name is legion. Doubtless, like the 
aforementioned saloonkeeper, they regard their 
oath of office as a mere matter of form, entailing 
no serious or real obligation. 

Morality is certainly at a very low ebb where 
things have come to such a pass as this. Few 
words — none in fact — are needed to show the 
groundlessness and the nonsense of such excuses ; 
and we can't help wondering if those who urge 
them really take them seriously. An oath freely 
(even though reluctantly) taken, or justly exacted, 
is strictly binding; and neither self-interest, nor 
friendship, nor sweet charity itself, can ever make 
it otherwise. To treat it as a mere empty form 
is a mockery of the Almighty. God does not lend 
Himself to empty forms. If quibbling and equiv- 
ocation are unpardonable in ordinary intercourse 
between man and man, they are still more inex- 
cusable when confirmed by a solemn oath. The 
only conceivable explanation of this frivolous dis- 
regard of sworn obligations by people professing 
belief in God and His justice, is thoughtlessness, 
or a failure to realize the nature of the act by 
which they call the Almighty God to witness the 



132 Mere: Hints: Moral, and Social. 

sincerity of their plighted word. It is high time 
to awaken to a sense of its serious and sacred 
character, for our present looseness in the matter 
is gradually weakening, and allowing to slip from 
under us. this strongest foundation of fa'th and 



[April 20, 19 io.] 

FORCE OF EXAMPLE 

GREAT is the responsibility of the men in 
high places, not only because of the trust 
committed to them, but also from the standpoint 
of example or influence. They owe to the public, 
as a matter of common justice, a conscientious 
performance of the duties of their position. This 
is an obligation which all duly recognize. They 
owe, too, on account of their prominence — what 
all members of the great human brotherhood 
owe in some measure — special efforts for the 
promotion of public morality. (This is a feature 
which is not kept so well in view.) Hence, when 
prominent public officials betray their trust — by 
peculation, gross negligence, connivance at wrong- 
doing, etc. — they are guilty of a two-fold breach — 
the one against common justice, the other a 
crime against social morality; and of the two, 
the latter is often the worse, because it is more 
far-reaching in its power for evil. The wrong 
done the public by notorious graft or thievery is 



M£r£ Hints: Moral and Social. 133 

bad enough, but the permanent or indefinite in- 
jury done to public morals is still worse. The 
crimes of the men in the limelight are rarely, if 
ever, isolated acts. Seldom do they stand alone. 
Their worst feature is that they commonly beget 
a brood of vipers like unto themselves. As the 
cry uttered in the solitude is echoed and re- 
echoed from hill to hill ; as the pebble cast upon 
the waters produces its apparently unending 
series of ripples, so with the public crime of him 
on whom the public eye is fixed. Its end no man 
can see ; its possible disastrous consequences none 
can foretell. It is as likely as not to prove an 
endless chain. A Boccaccio may repent of his 
Decameron, but he cannot recall it, or undo its 
effects. 

Those who are beyond the pale of example, 
or strong enough to resist its influence, are the 
rare exceptions rather than the rule. Where high 
moral standards are the vogue in public life, 
they are bound to inspire a regard for upright 
dealing in the rank and file of the people. On the 
contrary, where flagrant official bribery, graft, 
duplicity, vote-buying and vote-selling, partiality 
in the administration of justice, etc., are the order 
of the day, they are bound to react on the masses. 
First or intermittent glimpses of vice are apt 
to repel, but oft-repeated, face-to-face views of 
it, gradually familiarize us with it, and take away 
its sting and loathsomeness. They create an 
immoral atmosphere which we are forced to 
breathe, and only the strongest, or morally sound- 
est, can successfully resist its disease-bearing 



134 Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 

germs. When the governors are given over, body 
and soul, to immoral practices, it is difficult to 
see the ways and means of stemming the tide 
of corruption among the governed. "If the blind 
lead the blind, will not both fall into the ditch ?" 
And what we say of public men holds equally 
true of all who have the direction of others, 
whether in church or state, in the schoolroom or 
the family circle. It is of little use to insist on 
the teachings of the moral law, if we fail to prac- 
tise what we preach. The object lesson of ex- 
ample is far more effective than the most learned 
disquisitions on morality. The men and women 
who live up to their convictions, by practising 
what they profess, have done more for morality 
and the social uplift, than all the wise, philosophic 
discourses of an Epictetus or a Marcus Aure- 
lius. They are practical instances of the working 
of the moral law, showing in the concrete, the 
possibility of regulating conduct in accordance 
with its dictates. One man of the type of New 
York's Governor is worth more to the cause 
of morality than a host of theoretical moralists. 
"Don't do as I do, but do as I say," is good 
enough in its way. True, the principles of moral- 
ity are ever the same — just as sound and bind- 
ing — no matter how numerous or how prominent 
the men who disregard them. Nevertheless, we 
must take men as we find them; and the fact 
remains that, for the most part, they are, and 
ever will be, far more deeply impressed by our 
acts, than they are by our words or precepts. 
And the men and women whose upright lives 



Mere: Hints: Moral and Social. 135 

are sources of light and strength to those within 
their circle, deserve to have their names recorded, 
and their memories revered, as the most noble 
and useful benefactors of society. 



[April 27, 1910.] 



THE MORAL FEATURE IN 
JOURNALISM 

THE distinctively moral element in modern 
journalism is not something extraneous to 
it, or merely grafted upon it. On the contrary, 
it is a perfectly natural feature, and one almost 
essential to the complete equipment of the pres- 
ent-day journal. For the many who lack either 
the time or the inclination to do any other serious 
reading, and for whom the daily newspaper is 
the chief or only mental pabulum, the iteration 
and reiteration of sound moral principles is a 
veritable godsend. It goes without saying that 
the modern press is not only a dispenser of news, 
but likewise one of the most influential of public 
teachers. It reaches a large class whom the pulpit 
fails to attract, and, in consequence, has it in 
its power to accomplish a vast amount of good, 
by becoming the willing ally of the professed 
teachers of morality. To catch the eye, and win 
the assent, of the thousands who will hearken to 
no professional moral guide, is surely no small 
gain, and gives the modern journal an opportunity 
of supplying a most pressing need. 



136 Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 

Even if we consider the newspaper only in its 
function of advocate and defender of the people's 
material well-being, the moral feature must ne- 
cessarily play an important part — at least as a 
means to an end. For there can be no enduring 
order, freedom, pr prosperity, where morality's 
laws are widely or openly ignored. As well try 
to build a house without foundation or walls, as 
attempt to establish a society on any other basis 
than morality. As the immortal Washington 
said in his Farewell Address : "Of all the dis- 
positions and habits which lead to political pros- 
perity, religion and morality are indispensable 
supports * * * the firmest props of the duties 
of men and citizens." If this is true of all forms 
of government — even the paternal — it is doubly 
true of a democracy, whose members are the real 
rulers, and whose stability depends, not so much 
on force, as on the good will and virtue of its 
citizens. The arts and sciences are unquestion- 
ably valuable aids to civilization and prosperity, 
but they cannot compensate for a lack of the 
moral sense or the natural virtues. Virtue, not 
learning, is the strongest bulwark of society. A 
glance at the origin of any strong state — whether 
ancient or modern — will show that it is not neces- 
sarily the most brilliant or the most highly cul- 
tured that lay the solid foundation of govern- 
ment and steer the ship of state through the 
wildest storms. It is rather the men of real 
character and pronounced virtue. Whatever 
tends, therefore, to make men better and stronger 
morally, conduces likewise to their political and 



Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 137 

economic betterment. The worth of a community 
is to be gauged, not by its wealth, but by the moral 
tone which pervades it. It is the height of un- 
wisdom to look upon mere creature comforts, or 
animal satisfaction, as the end of government, or 
the measure of civilization. As Gladstone once 
remarked : "The question of greatest interest 
and importance is, not what manner of producer, 
but what manner of man, the American of the 
future is going to be." 

And this is precisely the end and aim of the 
moral feature in modern journalism — to aid in 
molding better men and better citizens, by keep- 
ing constantly before their minds the high ideals 
to which they should tend ;. by standing aloft on 
the watch-tower and ever pointing boldly and 
unerringly to the eternal principles of truth and 
justice, which alone can accomplish the desired 
end. That the high-toned, moral journals have 
succeeded in their efforts, is sufficiently evidenced 
by the great moral awakening they have brought 
about in various parts of the country. They have 
stirred the people at large to a sense of their 
power and duty, and made the guilty tremble. 
The increased demand for the deposition and 
punishment of corrupt officials, and the substitu- 
tion of honest men, the graft probes, etc., are sub- 
stantial proofs that it has made good. "By their 
fruits ye shall know them." 



138 Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 
[May 4, igio.] 

THE PHILOSOPHY OF TRIFLES 

SHREWD judges of character never take their 
cue from a man's big or exceptional per- 
formances, but rather from his ordinary, every- 
day, habitual manner of acting. And, of course, 
they are right. The big things are scarcely a fair 
test, for they put people on exhibition, and in 
such circumstances they are likely to strain and 
overstrain themselves to appear at their best, 
or even better than they really are. To know 
one's worth or worthlessness, he must be caught 
in unguarded moments, when he is not posing, 
or conscious of being observed. A straw will 
show the way the wind blows, and apparent 
trifles often afford the best key to human char- 
acter. After all, the big things are the rarities. 
Life for the most part is made up of the little 
ones, as the broad universe is made up of the 
atoms ; and it is the little things that usually 
make or mar. The philosopher and the student 
of history know full well that seeming trifles 
are often fraught with most serious consequences, 
and no man, of whatever rank or condition, who 
disregards the little things, will ever amount 
to much. Historian, artist, scientist, strategist, 
physician, lawyer and man of business, all alike 
recognize the fact that close attention to details 
is essential to success. 

Some of the most momentous happenings of 
history can trace their origin back to seeming 
trifles, and the making or unmaking of the world's 



Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 139 

great men depends not seldom on a little act of 
prudence or a little slip. It is the little social 
amenities too, the little acts of thoughtfulness — 
and not the grand dress parade — that show the 
real lady or gentleman. In this connection, the 
reader may recall the plain truths uttered in New 
York a few weeks ago, by a discerning man, anent 
the woful lack of manners in the great metropo- 
lis ; and still later, the confirmation and extension 
of his charges by a member of the Federal com- 
mittee appointed to escort the visiting delegation 
of Japanese business men. Had these statements 
been made by aliens, we might find reasons for 
resentment, but the fact that they came from our 
own, from judicious, fair-minded and competent 
Americans, who mention them with regret, and 
solely for the purpose of bettering conditions, is 
a sufficient voucher for their accuracy, even if 
we were not already painfully aware of our 
shortcomings in this respect. Their criticisms 
are not at all unjust or extravagant, and we 
might as well "acknowledge the corn/' No good 
can come of closing our eyes to the facts. There 
is nothing to gain, and much to lose, in wilfully 
blinding ourselves to the manifest truth, how- 
ever unpalatable. Observant and honest tourists 
are quick to notice, and frank enough to admit, 
the — to us — humiliating contrast between our- 
selves and some of the older peoples of Europe, 
in regard to the little things which don't cost 
much to the giver but often mean a great deal to 
the recipient; the little attentions and courtesies 
that lessen the woes of the stranger in a strange 



140 Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 

land, and brighten and sweeten life generally. 
While there are undoubtedly numerous excep- 
tions, it is undeniable that, in the average, taking 
man for man, we are lamentably behindhand in 
the matter, not so much in the big affairs of social 
life, as in the important little social amenities — 
in that "to the manner born" or bred-in the-bone 
politeness which characterizes even the peasant 
of Southern Europe. It is not that we are more 
radically selfish, or wanting in regard for others. 
It is rather the result of thoughtlessness, due to 
our habitual hurry and pre-occupation. Perhaps, 
too, because with us everything is on a big scale 
— the country itself, its institutions, manufac- 
tures, etc. — and being constantly confronted with 
big things, we are apt to lose sight of the little 
ones. But whatever the reasons for it, it is a 
distinction that we can well afford to drop with- 
out loss of prestige, and with considerable profit 
to ourselves from the standpoint of the social 
relations. 



[May ii, 19 io.] 

DOING OUR OWN THINKING 

WE ARE told by those who ought to know, 
that the Creator made no two things per- 
fectly alike. His plan is harmony in variety. 
In His government of the world, too, we find the 
same scheme in operation. As Tennyson has it: 

The old order changeth, yielding place to new, 

And God fulfils Himself in many ways, 

Lest one good custom should corrupt the world. 



Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 141 

There would seem to be ground enough in 
this to justify the creature, too, in showing a 
little individualism, which is but another name 
for naturalness. It is perfectly clear, from the 
manner of our making, that God never intended 
thinking men to conduct themselves like a flock 
of sheep dumbly following the bell-wether. It 
is a most common and a most baneful habit — 
that of over-eagerness to get in the swim, of fall- 
ing in line with ready-made conduct and opinions 
to which we would never think of subscribing 
if we only took the trouble to form our own 
convictions, and had the courage to follow them. 
There are, of course, people who haven't brains 
enough to think for themselves, and these must 
necessarily follow the leader or have no views 
at all. But for those who can do their own think- 
ing, it is unmanly and unnatural to be everlasting- 
ly bowing and scraping to self-elected arbiters, 
or getting in line with the unthinking mob which 
blindly follows them. The vox popali is not al- 
ways the vox Dei — or rather the seeming voice 
of the people is often but an echo, the unre- 
flecting and weak acceptance of policies and views 
which they do not really indorse, and which 
they frequently adopt without examination or 
proof. 

Truth and facts there are, and laws and cus- 
toms, so well established that no man is justified 
in disputing them ; for no man is morally free to 
reject the manifest truth. Such freedom would 
only pave the way to anarchy in thought and ac- 
tion. But beyond the pale of undisputed truth, 



14:? Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 

there are innumerable questions of taste, of art 
and literature, of fashion and politics, etc., which 
do not call for unanimity. They are among the 
things of which St. Paul says: "Let every man 
abound in his own sense." Centuries ago the 
great Augustine tersely outlined the proper policy 
in these matters: "In things necessary, unity; 
in doubtful questions, liberty; in all, forbear- 
ance." The habit of aping or imitating others, 
of letting them do our thinking and judging, be- 
gets artificiality and insincerity. It dries up the 
sources of mental and moral energy, and under- 
mines the individuality or naturalness which 
constitutes the charm and life of all human so- 
ciety. Blind, unthinking partisanship is detri- 
mental both to the individual and society at large. 
It is the reasonable independence of thought and 
action that makes a community sound and vig- 
orous. Emerson once remarked that "it is the 
vice of our public speaking that it has not 
abandonment. Somewhere, not only every ora- 
tor, but every man, should let out all the length 
of all the reins ; should find or make a frank and 
hearty expression of what force and meaning is 
in him." In conduct and expression, where free- 
dom of choice is legitimate, it wouldn't be such 
a bad idea to imitate the child, whose actions and 
attitudes are generally graceful, because they are 
the offspring of the moment, free from affecta- 
tion and pretense. His naturalness saves him 
from that miserable abject slavery to parties and 
fashions which is so often the bane of his elders. 



Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 143 

A pair whom we once met strolling through 
a famous art gallery will serve to illustrate the 
point we are trying to drive home. They were 
man and wife and, to all appearances, about 
equally matched in wits. The woman belonged 
to the genus of sham lovers of art. She had all 
the catch-words and cant phrases of the dilet- 
tante at command, and sought every occasion to 
give them utterance; but the husband frankly 
owned up that the only works of art that in- 
terested him were paintings of dogs and horses. 
Of the two, we would vastly prefer the old man. 
We may not have thought much of his taste, but 
we can't help admiring his honesty and natural- 
ness. We feel that at least his opinions are his 
own, not borrowed from books and connoisseurs — 
and that's more than can truthfully be said of 
his esthetic consort. The- pilfered opinions of the 
dilettante serve only to make him ridiculous to 
those who know. Whether in art or literature, 
in fashion or politics, it is the part of common 
sense to get on our own level and stay there 
Our opinions may not always be in accord with 
the majority, or even with the accepted canons 
of good taste, but at least they are our own, 
honestly come by, and truthfully expressed. And 
their honesty, truth and naturalness will make 
amends for many minor imperfections. 



144 Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 
[May 18, 19 10.] 

GETTING THE PROPER FOCUS 

HE WHO cannot put himself in the place of 
those whom he undertakes to criticise, will 
never become a just critic of men and measures. 
To judge the people of other times and other 
countries by our exclusive standards is rank in- 
justice. In his character of historian, the chron- 
icler of the past and the distant must be wedded 
to no fixed theories, for he is judge as well as 
recorder. Personally he may and must have his 
preferences, but they need not, and should not, 
influence his judgments. If he reads the past 
only in the light of the present, he is sure to be 
prejudiced. And furthermore, to render an abso- 
lutely just verdict, one must have a sort of sym- 
pathy with those whom he judges, must be able 
to look at things from their standpoint. And 
the same rule that holds good in matters histori- 
cal, applies to all our common, everyday estimates 
of human acts and motives. The ordinary mortal, 
no less than the historian, needs the philosophic 
breadth of view, and the sympathetic touch, if he 
would escape the odium of partiality or bias. We 
may have good reason to consider our own 
standards the best ever, but that's not the ques- 
tion. Neither, by the way, has it the force of 
a mathematical axiom. There are many who 
don't deem our standards the best, and since it is 
not a matter of self-evident truth, they are per- 
fectly entitled to their opinion. At any rate — 
and this is the important point — all do not look 



Mere: Hints: Moral and Social. 145 

at things as we do. Others see them their own 
way, and do them their own way. Some of them 
are placed in circumstances altogether different 
from ours, and they have, in consequence, a 
perfect right to demand that we judge them 
according to their own standards, not by ours.* 

We free-born sons and daughters of Columbia 
are frequently wont to boast of a tolerance and 
breadth of view which our unguarded speech 
and conduct often belie. John Bull has not a 
monopoly of narrowness and insularity. There 
are others who arrogantly assume that their own 
institutions, customs, manners, etc., are perfect, 
and the rest all wrong; people who, in dealing 
with less progressive nations, never think of 
taking into account the effects of climate, soil and 
the various other hindrances by which they are 
beset. Apropos of this, a very energetic woman 
who spent five or six years in Cuban hospital 
service, remarked recently that, during her first 
few months on the island, she was disgusted with 
the apathy and indolence of the natives, but she 
added that in less than a year she had become one 
of them. Her admission confirms the truth of 
the point we are trying to make — that to judge 
others justly, we must put ourselves in their place, 
and make due allowance for their drawbacks. 
Unquestionably, in many respects we have gone 
far beyond the nations of the past, and the older 



*Of course we are not speaking here of fixed and inviola- 
ble moral standards — of unchanging moral principles which 
are the same everywhere, and at all times, and about which 
there can be but one correct opinion. We speak rather of 
different national customs and manners, questions of taste, 
etc., about which there may be an honest, and perfectly legiti- 
mate difference of opinion. 



146 Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 

nations of the present. It is but the natural work- 
ing of evolution's law and gives us no right to 
boast, or to think less of those who have gone 
before. Distant posterity will find many a flaw 
in the things which we of the present deem so 
perfect — perhaps as many as we now see in the 
peoples who flourished "in the dark backward 
and abysm of time." 

It would be impossible to emphasize too 
strongly the importance of getting the right 
focus when we attempt to pry into the actions 
and motives of our fellow-men. And until we 
get it, impartial justice or fairness is out of the 
question. In public and private life, we are too 
prone to set ourselves up as the standard of 
measurement — a virtual claim to infallibility. 
Whoso conforms not to our way of thinking 
and acting, is all wrong. Of all the various ends 
of education there is none of greater moment 
than this — to rid ourselves of narrow prejudice 
and one-sidedness ; to school ourselves to look 
at events through the eyes of the actors who 
took part in them, and while holding fast to our 
own honest convictions, to give others, too, a 
little credit for sense and honesty. It is the 
presence of this trait, or mental attitude, that 
marks the best type of culture and good breed- 
ing, of genuine religion and sound philosophy. 
To its absence is due that baleful spirit of narrow 
sectionalism and bigoted intolerance, which has 
proved in every age »the curse of humanity. 
Without tolerance, sympathy, and broad-minded- 
ness, there can be neither historical equity nor 



Mer£ Hints: Moral and Social. 117 

common, everyday justice and fairness, and until 
we get these indispensable requisites, we are sure- 
ly in no position to sit in judgment on our fellow- 
men. 



[May 2$, 19 io.] 

THE AMERICAN SNOB ABROAD 

THE EVENING SUN of May 17 gave some 
striking extracts from the impressions of a 
London Times correspondent who has been ac- 
companying Colonel Roosevelt on his European 
tour. In substance, the extracts amount to this — 
that the Roosevelt tour has opened the eyes of 
cultivated Americans, caused them to realize that 
modern monarchs and monarchies are by no 
means an unmixed evil, and made them cease to 
think of Europe as the home of a "wayback," 
effete and decadent civilization. It is perfectly 
clear that the correspondent thinks Americans 
need to have their eyes opened. Nor is he alone 
in this. And, after making due allowance, who 
will say that his opinion is utterly unfounded? 
Unfortunately, too many of our fellow-country- 
men don't content themselves with merely think- 
ing the thoughts attributed to them. They 
act their thoughts, too, and reduce their theories 
to practice, both at home and abroad, thereby 
bringing not only themselves, but their country, 
too, and its people into disrepute. No doubt they 
think their spread-eagleism and arrogance very 



148 Mkre Hints: Moral and Social. 

impressive and awe-inspiring, something well cal- 
culated to generate a wholesome respect in the 
poor, benighted European. Instead of that, it 
begets the perfectly correct notion that they are 
vulgar upstarts. 

Soon the tourist season will be in full swing, 
and the Americanos and Americanas, with well- 
thumbed Baedeker in hand, will be familiar and 
easily recognized figures in the streets, the art 
galleries, and other public buildings of the great 
European cities. Troops of our well-fed, pros- 
perous-looking compatriots will be seen, day by 
day, losing their time gazing on the works of the 
great masters, and the grand old historic piles, 
with as much nonchalance as if they were in- 
specting a leg of mutton — and, we may safely 
add, with far less intelligence. However, this 
is not a crime. If there is any fault, it is a fault 
of the head and not of the heart, and they are 
more to be pitied than blamed for it. There 
is a far worse feature, and one for which they 
are fully responsible — and that is their too com- 
mon exhibition of disagreeable, ill-mannered, 
coarse-grained conduct. The vulgar, ill-bred, 
purse-proud tourist, with his contempt for anti- 
quity and scorn for traditions, and arrogant airs, 
is the laughing stock of all Europe, and a thorn 
in the side of his own decent countrymen. He 
doesn't want to be pleased; the Lord himself 
couldn't please him. He is simply waiting for a 
chance to voice his loud-mouthed protest, to 
proclaim anew the declaration of American inde- 
pendence — while the waiters smile and wink at 



Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 149 

one another behind his back, as if to say: He 
has the money, but that's all. In such cases, one 
can't help feeling that the servants have more 
real gentlemanliness than those whom they serve. 

In a way, tourist parties carry about with 
them the fair name of their country, and, truth 
to say, some of them do their unconscious level 
best to besmirch it. We don't mean to say that 
these people are representative Americans. Far 
from it. But, unfortunately, they are the only 
specimens that a large portion of the Europeans 
ever come in contact with, and consequently 
the only types on which they can base their esti- 
mate of us. And in following this plan, we can 
scarcely blame them, since many of our own 
compatriots get their opinion of a whole nation 
from the few disreputable samples which they 
have in their midst. 

These remarks are made, not from any over- 
weening desire to play the censor, but rather with 
deep regret — with a feeling of " 'tis true, 'tis pity, 
and pity 'tis, 'tis true." They are meant only for 
the vulgar blusterers, for the creatures whose 
conduct is characterized by The Evening Sun of 
May 17 ("The Childish City") as "that some- 
what absurd effervescence which passes in the 
roaring West for superhuman enterprise and 
energy." The reference is to some pushing Chi- 
cagoans who came very nigh turning their King 
Edward memorial service into a pandemonium. 
It would seem that those who make such a ridicu- 
lous and pitiable exhibition of themselves at 
home, can ill afford to pose as exemplars abroad. 



150 Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 

And yet they are precisely the ones who do it, 
as soon as they get money enough to see the 
world. There is but one word suited to label 
these creatures properly, and that is the mean 
little word ''snobs." 



[June i, 19 io.] 

MALICIOUS INNUENDOES 

AMONG its "Proverbs and Phrases" The Sun 
of May 18 contained one which is worth 
more than a passing notice. It is this : "The 
most mischievous liars are those who keep sliding 
on the verge of truth." Of all society disturbers 
and reputation wreckers, the most artful and the 
most successful is the innuendo man — the vile 
creature who adopts the policy of the broad hint, 
or the malicious insinuation. The thoroughgoing 
slanderer is bad enough, but at least he leaves 
us a loophole of escape. His lie is likely to find 
him out some time or other. His charge, too, is 
something definite, something that we can put 
our finger upon — and not infrequently disprove. 
We can bring him to bay, and force him to make 
good, or confess himself the liar he is. But, un- 
luckily, with the other fellow — the artful insinua- 
tor — there is no such means of redress. There 
is nothing really tangible to lay hold of. He 
avoids specific accusations, hints but vaguely, and 
if put to it, can easily wriggle out of the difficulty. 



Mere: Hints: Moral and Social. 151 

When founded on fact, the malicious hint 
often does vastly more harm than the full dis- 
closure. It has about it an air of mystery, which 
brings on a train of imaginings, and begets 
groundless suspicions which would quickly melt 
into thin air were the whole truth known. More 
especially is this the case when the evil hint is 
blended with words of commendation : "He's an 

honest and a temperate man, etc., but" Oh, 

that mean, vile, hypocritical little "but" that has 
severed so many friendships and befouled so many 
a fair name ! Where so much of good is spoken, 
and the mean little "but" uttered with a regretful 
sigh, it often looks like real pity. In reality it is 
but decking out and garlanding the victim for 
the sacrifice. The encomium is used only as a 
means of attaining a dastardly purpose : "With 
colors fairer painting their foul ends." The 
slanderer is frequently but a clumsy blunderer. 
Not so the skilful innuendo man. He at least 
is no bungler. He is a real tactician, a genuine 
strategist. His is verily the refinement of cruelty. 

While we are about the subject, it may be in 
order to recall that it is not only the deliberate, 
designing insinuator who succeeds in ruining 
reputations. The best of us sometimes accom- 
plish the same deplorable result without at all 
intending it. "Evil is wrought by want of thought, 
as well as want of heart." Our good name is 
like the lily whose whiteness and purity are 
sullied by the one foul touch. It is so easy, in an 
unguarded moment, by careless words and hints 
dropped in the course of a conversation, to inflict 



152 Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 

a damage which years of effort may be unable 
to repair. The thoughtless and hare-brained 
talker may work as much havoc as the malevo- 
lent, scoundrelly calumniator. As some one puts 
it: 

Many a shaft at random sent 
Finds mark the archer little meant, 
And many a word at random spoken 
May hurt or heal a heart nigh broken. 

It may not be very good poetry, but it is cer- 
tainly good, common sense. There are a few 
lines from Pope that might be remembered with 
profit, in connection with our theme: "Speak 
clearly if you speak at all ; carve every word be- 
fore you let it fall." They bear directly on the 
matter in hand, and afford an excellent motto, or 
rule of conduct. By far the best plan is not to 
speak at all of the evil we see in our fellow-men. 
But if we must speak, then let us at least be 
fair and square, just and honest. The whole truth 
or nothing. Better far the plain, downright truth 
than the mean, miserable, malicious little hint. 
Concerning the second point of the poet's advice, 
it seems to ask a little too much. We scarcely 
have time to carve every word before letting it 
fall. But at any rate, a little sober reflection on 
the serious evils — the vast amount of misery, hate 
and injustice — wrought by careless, imprudent 
speech might make us very much more guarded 
and cautious in touching upon the character, con- 
duct, and motives of our neighbors. We should 
rightly consider ourselves to blame if we occa- 
sioned another's material loss or physical injury, 



Msre Hints: Moral and Social. 153 

not only by positive acts, but also by gross negli- 
gence or carelessness, and his good name is of 
more concern to him than his material and phy- 
sical well-being. As for the rascally innuendo 
man, he deserves no mercy or consideration, and 
should meet with none. He can't be punished 
legally, though his act is often worse than a peni- 
tentiary offence. But at least we can refuse to 
listen to him, We can show, by word and man- 
ner, the kind of regard we have for him. Finally 
we can and, in the interest of humanity, peace 
and brotherly love, should, consign him irrevoca- 
bly to the hades of social outlawry. 



[June 8, 1910.] 

THE BEST PHILANTHROPY 

GOD loves a cheerful giver, and true philan- 
thropy is a service of both head and heart. 
As to the first: All practical charity workers are 
agreed that indiscriminate almsgiving is worse 
than none. It serves only to increase the already 
too large horde of lazy impostors, and tends to 
defeat the real end and purpose of charity, which 
is to set the needy on their feet, and give them 
a chance to help themselves. To give really 
effective aid — to bestow charity where it will 
do most good — the scientific method of observa- 
tion and experiment is requisite. By this means 
alone can the philanthropist, or the Lady Boun- 
tiful, succeed in sifting the wheat from the chaff, 



154 Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 

and in weeding out the shameless shams whose 
tricks and lies often sour the generous giver, and 
make him feel like turning a deaf ear to all ap- 
peals. 

But while the head, or intelligence, is a neces- 
sary element in judicious philanthropy, it is cer- 
tainly not the only element. The heart, too, is an 
indispensable ingredient. Unless head and heart 
join forces, and work together in unison, there 
can be little real good accomplished. This is not 
only the teaching of Christ and His Scriptures, or 
of churchmen. It is likewise the unfailing and 
unvarying conclusion of all who have given any 
serious and intelligent thought to the matter — even 
of thinkers animated by no religious purpose, but 
solely by concern for the interests of humanity. 
Without the brotherly love — the sympathetic 
touch that makes the whole world akin — our best 
efforts are shorn of half their effectiveness. "Man 
liveth not on bread alone." He needs the bread, 
of course, but he needs the sympathy too — and 
sometimes more than the bread. The best friend 
of the poor is the man who gives not only his 
money, but himself. 

When men and women, the world over, come 
to look upon the fatherhood of God and the 
brotherhood of men, not as a mere pretty senti- 
ment, but as an actual fact, then only, will genuine 
charity abound. The day of selfish egotism — of 
the subordination of the many to the favored 
few — is past and gone, let us hope, forever. The 
cry is no longer "Every man for himself and Goc 
for us all," but rather "Every man for his 



Mlre Hints: Moral and Social. 155 

brother." Time was when a Renan could say, 
without being tabooed, that "forty millions may 
well be regarded as dung, do they but supply the 
fertility which will produce one truly great man." 
The man who would dare voice such a sentiment 
today would be justly considered beneath our 
contempt. Nor is there anything novel in our 
modern methods of dealing with poverty and 
suffering in all its various forms. It is simply a 
case of "Back to Christ." Amid the ever-grow- 
ing multitude of new-coined phrases — the great- 
est happiness of the greatest number — the substi- 
tution of altruism for egotism, etc. — some of us 
are apt to forget that our present attitude in 
these matters indicates no new philosophy, no 
new social system, but purely and simply a re- 
turn to the principles of Christianity. The world 
may, and does, adapt these principles to new con- 
ditions, but it has never been, and never will be, 
able to improve on the principles themselves. 
Most thinkers who even deny Christ's divinity, 
and regard him only as a social teacher, will ad- 
mit so much. 



[June 15, 1910.] 

THE MOTH AND THE FLAME 

KEEP away from the fire if you don't want to 
get burned. With its wings singed, and its 
tiny anatomy fast shriveling up, the moth still 
persists in drawing nigher and nigher unto the 



156 Mere: Hints: Moral, and Social,. 

flame. It would seem that its first or second 
costly experience should make it wiser. But the 
glare of the light is too strong and alluring — 
stronger even than the instinct of self-preserva- 
tion — and so it continues beating about till it is 
caught and held in the grasp of death. We mar- 
vel at its foolishness, and straightway do the same 
ourselves. The poor moth is not to blame for its 
folly; it doesn't know any better. Great man 
sometimes makes as little use of his reasoning 
faculty, as the moth does of its instinct. He 
wonders why it is that, in spite of his good in- 
tentions and resolutions, he relapses again and 
again into the evil habits which in his heart he 
detests, and is inclined to lay his failings at the 
door of fate, heredity, accident, etc. Evidently 
he has never brought home to himself with suffi- 
cient force, the truth of Franklin's homely but 
wise old saw, "God helps those who help them- 
selves," or of the warning words of a far greater 
than Franklin, "He who loves danger shall perish 
therein." 

Dr. Samuel Johnson used to wonder why he 
was so frequently unable to arise before dinner 
time. With all his great powers, it never seemed 
to occur to him that it was because he didn't get 
to bed in time. And so with ourselves. We are 
often surprised at our lapses, but without ever 
a thought of retrenching at the other end, of 
avoiding the occasions of these lapses. Young 
folk — and older ones, too — frequently dally and 
trifle with temptation, in the fullest self-confi- 
dence of being able to rein in and draw up at the 



Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 157 

proper time. At starting, they haven't the slight- 
est intention of going the limit; but they rely 
entirely too much on their will power, or perhaps 
on blind chance. The clerk who begins to dabble 
in stocks, and incidentally "borrows" his em- 
ployer's money to get the wherewith, rarely fore- 
sees where he is likely to land. The youth who 
starts betting on the races, or any other form of 
gambling, as a pastime or temporary excitement, 
may be at first dead set against allowing it to de- 
velop into an overmastering passion. The man 
with a weakness for drink often begins by assur- 
ing himself that he won't go too far — not beyond 
one or two. The maiden who permits herself 
undue freedom of conduct, may have no thought 
of the end to which her frivolousness is apt to 
lead. But in all these cases, like the moth and the 
flame, the lure of the light proves too strong. 
Singed again and again, without at all profiting 
by past experiences, they persist in taking chances, 
till they are burned hopelessly, irremediably. For, 
in spite of our freedom of will, it is not always 
possible to stop when and where we will, on the 
down grade. Self-indulgence, or abuse of the will, 
weakens, and sometimes almost completely para- 
lyzes it. Like the stone rolling down the hill- 
side, the farther one goes down the steep declivity 
of evil, the more velocity he acquires, and the 
more difficult it is to call a halt. In fact, there 
must come a point at which halting is practically 
out of the question. We have it in our power to 
stave of! this crisis, but if we suffer it to come, the 
issue is plain enough. As regards the physical 



158 Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 

man, there are serious bodily diseases curable if 
taken in their incipiency, but almost invariably 
fatal if allowed to develop. In the moral order, 
too, it is comparatively easy to rid ourselves of 
evil tendencies, if they are taken in time; but if 
suffered to strike deep root, to become habits, 
the task may prove a Herculean one, and the 
stronger and older the habit, the more difficult is 
the task of uprooting it. 

Should we ever reach the point at which some 
particular vice has become a sort of second nature 
to us, it will do no good to rail at fate or destiny. 
There is no fate for us but such as we choose for 
ourselves. We have it in our power to make or 
mar ourselves. If we choose to make, rather 
than mar, our destiny, we have the secret, given 
long ago by one who knew : "Resist beginnings." 



[June 22, 19 io.] 

GROPING AFTER THE MYSTERIOUS 

THE unseen world has ever possessed a strong 
fascination for the human mind, almost 
since time began. And this practically universal 
fascination has proved one of the most power- 
ful arguments for the existence of a life beyond 
the grave. Much of this belief in things unseen 
is, of course, based on what both Christian and 
Hebrew accept as a revelation from the Almighty, 
and is, therefore, highly commendable. But as 



Mere: Hints: Moral and Social. 159 

the rank weeds continually spring up beside the 
useful plant, so, in all ages, the grossest and most 
ridiculous superstitions have kept pace with the 
solid and well-grounded truth. Restless minds, 
seekers after novelty, not content to remain on 
the beaten track, are ever wandering off into the 
devious by-paths of the illegitimate occult. It 
was so in the ancient dispensation, for we find 
the author of the book of Deuteronomy con- 
demning, in the strongest terms, wizards, charm- 
ers, those who consulted soothsayers, fortune 
tellers, pythonic spirits, who observed dreams and 
omens, or sought truth from the dead : "For the 
Lord," he says, "abhorreth all these things, and 
for these abominations He will destroy them." 
All students of mediaeval history are familiar with 
the practice of the Black Art in the Middle Ages. 
And in our own day, the rage for the occult has 
evidently not abated one jot or tittle. 

A goodly proportion of these devotees of oc- 
cultism are, of course, persons of abnormal and 
morbid personality — but not all. Many of them 
are sensible enough in the common affairs of life. 
Some have claimed that all men are more or less 
insane, and that between those pent up in the 
madhouse, and those on the outside, there is 
only a difference of degree. We would be among 
the very last to indorse this view ; but if anything 
could win our indorsement, it would likely be the 
sight of so many persons, apparently normal and 
well balanced in business, politics, and most other 
matters, completely losing their heads, their rea- 
son and common sense, when there is question 



160 Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 

of the occult. In their ordinary dealings, they 
wouldn't think for a moment of trusting an un- 
known man. They would be among the first to 
demand his credentials, and look into his ante- 
cedents. But when an Oriental mystic, or some 
other of the thousand and one brazen impostors 
appears on the scene, with a pretended message 
from the other world, and his boasted superior 
knowledge of things invisible, the ordinary laws 
of common sense are set aside. No matter how 
absurd and fantastic the new luminary and his 
lights, he is usually pretty sure of a hearing and 
a following. The popular gullibility in these 
matters is truly amazing. 

It would seem that the empty vaporings of the 
pseudo-prophets would of themselves prove a 
sufficient safeguard against them; but if that 
won't suffice, we can find a sure and easy test in 
the words of the Founder of Christianity: "By 
their fruits ye shall know them," and their fruits 
consist chiefly of the coin they manage to ab- 
stract from the pockets of their deluded victims. 
For one who has anything approaching a correct 
idea of God, it is inconceivable that He would 
make use of such instruments, as mediums of 
communication between Himself and His crea- 
tures. That many wonderful spiritistic phen- 
omena have actually occurred, seems to be fairly 
well established by the researches of level-headed, 
painstaking, unbiassed men like the members of 
the society for Psychic Research. But when we 
look into the character of those who claim su- 
perior insight into the hidden and the future, and 



Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 161 

the nature of their communications, we can't help 
feeling that the majority of those who really have 
any exceptional knowledge or power of the kind, 
must surely get it from below, not from above. 



[June 29, 19 10.] 

MAN'S INHUMANITY TO MAN 

AN ex-convict — an Englishman — writing re- 
cently of his prison experiences, has this to 
say of himself: "I have served four terms in 
various prisons. I was rightly convicted of my 
first offense, but never since have I been given 
a fair chance to become an honest citizen again." 
And he goes on to relate how he was shadowed 
and hounded after his release, his footsteps 
dogged, and his every act suspected. There is 
nothing difficult of belief in his narrative. It is 
the old story of Jean Valjean. ''Give a dog a bad 
name and hang him." It is hard for the fallen 
man to rise. What would pass unnoticed in those 
of spotless repute, is looked upon in his case as 
evidence of fresh guilt. And the saddest part of 
it all is, that the people who assume this unre- 
lenting attitude toward the down-and-out, are not 
infrequently sticklers for the highest morality, 
aye, and loudly professing followers of the gentle 
and forgiving Christ, Who left the ninety-nine 
good sheep in the desert to seek the one that was 
lost, Who told Peter to forgive his brother, not 



162 Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 

once, or seven times merely, but seventy times 
seven, and Who, in the case of the adulterous 
woman, closed the mouths of the self-righteous 
Pharisees, and put them to shame, by looking 
straight into their eyes and quietly saying: "Let 
him that is without stain among you cast the 
first stone at her." And one by one they guiltily 
slunk away. 

There can be little doubt that He would act 
likewise if He were present in some of our saintly 
(sic) coteries of today when, with bated breath 
and whispered tones, they utter their solemn 
"Isn't it awful," concerning some poor wretch 
who, in God's sight, may not be very much worse 
than themselves. As an illustration of this, the 
reader will recall Christ's own parable of the 
proud Pharisee and the lowly publican. While 
listening to the boastful language of the former, 
we scarcely know whether to give way to indig- 
nation or laughter. His self-conceit is so childish 
and silly that we both despise and pity him. But 
not too fast. Perhaps if we examine his features 
closely, we may find in them some family likeness. 
He is by no means a rare specimen. There are 
plenty of him in the world. To speak plainly, 
there are unfortunately too few of us who have 
not a dash of the Pharisee in our make-up. We 
may not be so open and blunt and barefaced about 
it, but it is skulking there somewhere, hidden in 
the depths, and we do unconsciously exhibit it 
now and then, and precisely in the cases to which 
we are referring— in our attitude toward the of- 
fending. When we needlessly and unwarrantably 



Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 163 

sit in judgment on our fellow-men, censure their 
conduct, and impugn their motives, are we not 
virtually acting the part of the proud Pharisee — 
standing up before God and the world and claim- 
ing exemption from the foibles and follies which 
we criticise in others? Is it not equivalent to the 
Pharisee's boastful prayer, "I give Thee thanks, 
O God, that I am not like this man"? 

Human observation and experience indicate 
that those who least need mercy for themselves 
are, at the same time, the most merciful toward 
others; and, all appearances to the contrary not- 
withstanding, we can't help suspecting that there 
is something wrong, somehow or somewhere, with 
those who have nothing but words Of condemna- 
tion for the weak and erring. It has been re- 
marked that the temporarily reformed are often 
the most severe on vices in which they once in- 
dulged. We use the words "temporarily reformed" 
designedly, being mindful of the warning words of 
Holy Writ: "Pride goeth before destruction, and 
before a fall, the heart is lifted up." It is as cer- 
tain as that two and two make four, that the un- 
merciful are not genuine Christians, for every page 
and every line of Christ's Gospel breathes mercy. 
Their religion is but a sham, a shadow, a tree with- 
out the vital sap. It may be fair enough to the eye, 
like the apple of the Dead Sea, but there is no 
substance in it. The heart is gone out of it. For 
the life and heart and essence of Christ's teaching 
is charity, mercy, forgiveness. 



164 Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 

[July 6, 19 io.] 

THE MORAL ELEMENT IN 
EDUCATION 

EVEN from the sole standpoint of the here and 
now, without any reference to a future life, 
there is nothing more desirable, or more neces- 
sary, than the spread of moral education. It is 
a work of the highest patriotism, for undoubtedly 
the welfare of our country hinges, not on ma- 
terial prosperity, or on brains and learning, but 
on a fuller knowledge of, and a stricter adher- 
ence to, the sound principles of morality. There 
is scarcely a dearth of brains or ability among 
our public men of today; yet day after day, 
usque ad nauseam, the press teems with disgust- 
ing accounts of public graft and corruption — a 
standing proof that the evil is due to a woful 
lack of the moral sense. No nation yet ever held 
together very long after it began to defy the laws 
of morality, to disregard the virtues of honesty 
and unselfishness, the sacredness of the marriage 
tie, respect for lawful authority, etc. It was this 
utter disregard that brought about the fall of 
Rome and the other great nations of antiquity; 
and if we are fated to go their way, sooner or 
later, it will be owing assuredly to the self-same 
causes. History repeats itself. 

What our young people, and many older folks, 
too, need is a thorough and solid grounding in 
the eternal, unchanging, and universal principles 
of the moral law. M. Ferdinand Brunetiere, the 
late eminent French savant, gave us, some years 



Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 165 

ago, in his article on "The Bankruptcy of Mod- 
ern Science," a history of the ignominious failure 
of certain latter-day scientists to substitute the 
useful and expedient for the true and ancient code 
of morals. Unfortunately, there are legions who 
still attempt this miserable substitution. Only 
recently a physician of some prominence re- 
marked, with a triumphant smile, apropos of a 
moral question, that we are living, not in the 
fourth, but the twentieth century. That seemed 
to him to clinch the argument. As if truth 
changed with the centuries ; or what was murder 
in the fourth century, ceases to be murder in the 
twentieth ! This man is only one of many, and 
it is to be hoped, for their own good and that of 
their patients, that he and others like him will 
learn that truth and justice stand fast forever. 



[July 13, 19 io.] 

CRIMINAL IGNORANCE 

THAT men are morally responsible, not only 
for the harm which they knowingly and 
wilfully cause, but also for the evil which results 
from conscious and gross negligence on their 
part, is an unassailable principle of ethics, but one 
which is unfortunately too often overlooked. It 
is an axiom of moral philosophy that "he who 
wills the cause, wills likewise the effect" ; only 
indirectly perhaps, but nevertheless to such an 



166 Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 

extent that he can justly be held accountable. We 
are taking it for g'ranted, of course, that such a 
one foresees, more or less clearly, the damage 
that is likely to result, some time or other, from 
his action or omission. A man of this type may 
seek to justify himself on the pretext that he does 
not really wish the evil, and that, if it were in 
his power, he would do his level best to prevent 
it. But all the same he is willing to take his 
chances. His judgment warns him that his be- 
havior is apt to lead to serious, and perhaps fatal, 
consequences, yet, for the safe of present gratifi- 
cation, or from culpable sloth, he is ready to run 
the risk. 

Take, for instance, the medical student who 
fritters away his time at college, neglecting es- 
sential, or at any rate important, points of the 
healing art, merely "plugging" and "cramming" 
for examinations, and barely managing to sneak 
through — practically stealing a diploma. He may 
feel like congratulating himself on his supposed 
good luck, and be more than ever induced to be- 
lieve that Fortune is blind of both eyes, but if he 
has any sense at all, he must realize that his cer- 
tificate means little or nothing, that he is abso- 
lutely unqualified for the profession he is enter- 
ing, and that, unless he makes up for lost time 
and opportunities, he is inevitably going to do a 
vast deal of harm to his future patients, through 
his guilty ignorance. At the moment of making 
a grave, perhaps fatal, mistake, he may be thor- 
oughly earnest and conscientious, he may be ut- 
terly unaware of his error, but that's neither here 



Mere: Hints: Moral and Social. 167 

nor there. Despite his subjective assurance, his 
act is criminal, for he deliberately put in motion 
the cause from which he foresaw that precisely 
such errors would, in all probability, result. Such 
a one is, to put it rather mildly, a swindler, and 
sometimes worse than a swindler, for he imperils 
human life. 

True, even for one of this class, there are ex- 
ceptional cases ; for example, hurry calls which 
admit of no delay, in which even a half-formed 
practitioner may possibly be better than none, 
and in which such a one is practically forced to 
act, and act quickly. Then, too, some of these 
men steady themselves later in life, when they 
come to realize fully the responsibilities they have 
assumed, and try to make ample amends for the 
carelessness of their student days. We are not 
speaking of them, but of the criminally ignorant 
who engage in regular practice ; and the amount 
of harm done by these, the loss of life and per- 
manent injury to health, the Lord alone knows. 
We mention the case of the physician, as affording 
a most striking instance of our meaning, by rea- 
son of the weighty interests committed to his 
trust, but it is by no means the only instance 
of the kind. The same holds true in one degree 
or other of the lawyer, the preacher — in fact, of 
everyone who has any work at all to do, even to 
the mending of a pair of shoes. ' And all who re 
main culpably ignorant of the duties of their sta- 
tion, be it high or low, are guilty of rank in- 
justice to those whose welfare is endangered by 
that ignorance. But while the principle applies, 



168 Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 

in some measure at least, to all — even the lowest — 
it goes without saying that the greater and the 
more numerous the interests involved, the more 
of a criminal one is for neglecting to acquire 
the knowledge requisite to perform his duties 
properly. 



[July 20, 19 io.] 

LOVE OF ONE'S WORK 

GIVING us the key to the philosophy of the 
present life, as well as the means of attain- 
ing the life to come, one of the sacred writers 
tells us : "Whatsoever thy hand findeth to do, 
do it with all thy might." Emerson gives his 
readers pretty much the same advice, when he 
says that the best type of man is the one who 
does well whatever he can do. But he hasn't 
pointed out the means that will enable men to 
do well and easily whatever they are able to do. 
That means was given centuries since by the 
great Augustine of Hippo in these pregnant 
words : "Where there is love there is no labor ; 
or, if labor there be, the labor itself is loved." 
That is the genuine secret of success in any call- 
ing—love of one's work, whatever the work may 
be. 

As a rule, we don't consider burdensome the 
service we render a friend; and even should the 
service prove difficult and wearisome, our affec- 
tion makes the very difficulty and weariness 



Mere Hints: Morai, and Social. 169 

something of a pleasure. The mother who stints 
and sacrifices herself for her children, spending 
anxious days and sleepless nights in their service, 
rarely stops to consider that she is doing some- 
thing heroic, because her mother-heart is in love 
with her task, or rather with those for whom 
she undertakes the task. Few men ever worked 
harder than Napoleon. In the intervals of en- 
forced cessation from military strife, his active 
mind was ceaselessly engaged on his legal code, 
or in drawing up plans of attack and defense, 
planning civic improvements, etc. Yet we don't 
know that he ever grumbled at being overworked, 
and the reason — because he was in love with his 
work. Many professional and business men toil 
harder and longer than the common laborer, with- 
out ever a word of complaint. On the contrary, 
they find their work a real pleasure, because they 
are thoroughly interested in it. And assuredly it 
is the part of wisdom for persons in any and 
every calling of life, to adopt the same tactics — 
to take things as they find them, and endeavor to 
make the best of them ; to cultivate a lively in- 
terest in their lifework, and try to become perfect 
in it, no matter how menial it may appear. We 
say no matter how menial it may appear, for in 
the words of the poet : 'There is no great and no 
small to the Soul that maketh all." 

It is a huge mistake to buoy up children with 
the false hope of becoming one day President of 
the United States, or Congressmen at the very 
least; or to encourage those who have not been 
sufficiently equipped by God and nature, to enter 



170 Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 

the professions, which are already overcrowded 
with incompetents. Better far to urge them seek 
their own level and stick to it. There is many a 
man in the medical and legal professions today, 
neither happy nor wealthy, and with little chance 
of ever becoming so, who might have attained 
local fame, and a reasonable competence, as a first- 
rate cobbler, had he not missed his vocation 
through his ambitious strivings to land in the 
upper stratum of society. 

That there is nothing degrading or undignified 
in honest labor, is a truth that needs to be more 
fully and deeply impressed on the youth of the 
present generation. If they take the lesson to 
heart, and heed it, it will be the means of making 
many of them a great deal happier and more 
successful in their journey through life. This 
may sound very much like a truism — it is a 
truism — but none the less it is too often lost sight 
of by the over-ambitious, but not over-wise, young 
men and women of the modern era. 



[July 27, 1910.] 

IDEALS 



SPEAKING of ideals, Louis Pasteur once re- 
marked : "Happy is the man who has a god 
in his heart" — the man who worships at the 
shrine of the beautiful, the true and the good. In 
the hurry and excitement of modern life, with 



Mere; Hints: Moral and Social. 171 

its hot pursuit of material comforts, if we would 
keep ourselves from degenerating into mere high- 
grade animals, or intelligent machines, if we wish 
to preserve and develop the moral side of our 
character, we must have a "god in our heart" — 
lofty ideals of truth, beauty and goodness — to 
which we can turn now and then for light and 
guidance and inspiration. This is no mere poetic 
fancy, or philosophic speculation, but an actual, 
practical, and living fact. It is the absence of 
these noble ideals that makes life not worth the 
living for so many, after they have been severely 
wounded by "the shafts and arrows of outrageous 
fortune." The man who has a "god in his heart" is 
never wholly daunted or overwhelmed by mis- 
fortune. No matter how serious his reverses 
may be, he has always something to fall back 
upon. The Jews of old were wont to ask : "Can 
any good come out of Nazareth?" And, in 
answer to their question, the greatest good of all 
times, the very Light of the World, came forth 
from the despised village; and so, too, the man 
of noble ideals, instead of repining at the inevita- 
ble ills which flesh is heir to, not infrequently 
manages to pluck his greatest victories from 
seeming defeat. 

Cultured Europeans have often declared that 
the American ideal is the almighty dollar. Time 
was when the charge was not wholly unfounded ; 
and in many quarters it has even now a fairly 
solid foundation. But, fortunately, its applica- 
tion to the American people as a whole, is grad- 
ually growing fainter and fainter ; and it is highly 



172 Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 

probable that the time is not far distant when 
it will be nothing short of a gross libel, and as- 
suredly the sooner, the better. The strenuous life 
of the modern business world tends, no doubt, to 
develop strength of character ; but if business suc- 
cess, or money-getting, is allowed to become the 
Alpha and the Omega, the beginning and the end 
of existence, the development is apt to be alto- 
gether one-sided. Without the gentler and nobler 
ideals — in fact, without a certain amount of day- 
dreaming — life is not unlikely to grow utterly 
sordid, dull and uninteresting. The modern trend 
is decidedly practical, and the tendency is to dis- 
card all that cannot be measured in terms of the 
useful or practical. In this connection, it can be 
said, with absolute truth, that there never was a 
time when the pursuit of high ideals proved use- 
less. Such ideals may, indeed, have no money 
value, they may be of little or no benefit from a 
commercial standpoint; but they certainly have 
an inestimable value from the added charm and 
zest they give to life, and their power to rescue 
from the ennui and boredom which must sooner 
or later follow purely material pursuits. 

Under present conditions, we are sadly in need 
of an admixture of idealism, or day-dreaming. 
Nor have we any reason to fear a moderate dose 
of it. There is not much danger of carrying the 
thing too far. We could not if we would. The 
rapidly revolving wheel of progress will not let 
us. There is no question that a modicum of the 
ideal would make life and its burdens more beara- 
ble. Put two men together in identical circum- 



Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 173 

stances. The one will glean every possible bit 
of good from his surroundings. Everything is 
grist for his mill; all nature has a voice for him, 
and he, an ear for it. The other will stand in the 
very midst of God's wondrous works like one 
deaf, dumb and blind. The birds and flowers have 
no message for him; or rather they have, but he 
does not heed it. Of course, some are more 
gifted than others in this respect, some minds 
more closely attuned to nature. All can't be 
poets, but all can acquire an intelligent apprecia- 
tion of natural truth, beauty and goodness. It 
is a habit of mind which can be cultivated by 
all. And assuredly it is well worth cultivating. 
Truly fortunate are they who, in the language 
of the poet : 

Find tongues in trees, 
Books in the running brooks; 
Sermons in stones, 
And good in everything. 



[August 3, 1910.] 

GOOD MANNERS AND ETIQUETTE 

THAT "a book is not to be judged by its cover" 
is a trite old saying, and one which no sen- 
sible man or woman will call in question. But 
unhappily our practice often ill accords with our 
theories. Through heedlessness and lack of dis- 
crimination, we have come to associate the lady 
and the gentleman with a certain standing in 



174 Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 

society, and with the observance of certain social 
conventionalities. There are not a few who would 
hesitate to term the hodcarrier or the washer- 
woman a gentleman or a lady, yet, in all pro- 
priety and justice, these people are often far more 
worthy of the appellation than those who flaunt 
it without challenge or question. Serious think- 
ers rightly distinguish between good manners or 
politeness, and mere etiquette. Dr. Maurice F. 
Egan^ the United States Minister to Denmark, 
has observed that "the best manners come from 
the heart, the best etiquette from the head." And 
Cardinal Newman was evidently of the same 
mind when he remarked that "good manners are 
the outward signs of true religion." 

It is possible for the very worst specimens 
of humankind to be the very best models of 
etiquette, but it is utterly impossible for such 
to be models of genuinely good manners. Many 
are wont to confuse these two — good manners 
and etiquette; but very little reflection will show 
that they are not at all identical. Etiquette holds 
much the same relation to -good manners as elocu- 
tion does to oratory, and a parallel may be fitly 
drawn between elocution and oratory on the one 
hand, and etiquette and good manners on the 
other. Books and masters and diligent practice 
may make a good elocutionist, but they can never 
make a real orator. There is a vast difference 
between the polished elocutionist, no matter how 
clear his enunciation, or how graceful his ges- 
tures, and the genuine orator. The former may 
please, but it takes the latter, be he ever so 



Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 175 

homely and uncouth, to persuade, and carry his 
audience away with him. The orator, like the 
poet, is born, not made; his power lies, not in 
artificial acquirements, but in his own character 
and convictions. And so with etiquette and good 
manners. The former may be learned from books, 
for it is nothing more than a set of conventional 
rules laid down for the external guidance of 
society. But something more is requisite for 
really good manners. They must come from the 
heart ; they are the product of character, and can 
no more be found in a radically bad man or 
woman than can wholesome fruit on a dead or 
rotten tree. 

A perfect knowledge and observance of the 
rules of etiquette may co-exist with an utter 
lack of genuine good manners, and the best man- 
ners can often be seen in people densely ig- 
norant of the first principles of etiquette. Eti- 
quette varies with time and place, but manners 
are ever the same, the wide world over. The 
man or woman without heart or character may, 
on occasion, assume or ape good manners, but 
it is just as impossible to perpetuate such a 
deception as it is for the Ethiopian to change his 
skin, or the leopard his spots. It is an artificial 
unnatural, forced position, and the thin veneer 
soon cracks. Apropos of this, it is said that the 
gods once transformed a cat into a lovely woman, 
and that she conducted herself with perfect pro- 
priety till a mouse ran across her path ; but from 
that moment, not even the gods of high Olympus, 
with all their power, could make her act as a 



176 Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 

real woman would have acted in the circum- 
stances. And so with the man of artificial man- 
ners. When off his guard, and acting according 
to his nature, he will invariably prove the best 
argument for the point we are trying to make. 
We have all known men, poor in this world's 
goods, humble and obscure, unable even to read 
or write — men who would start with surprise if 
they heard themselves spoken of as "gentlemen" — 
yet richly endowed with the true politeness that 
comes from a good, kind heart. We have known, 
too, people blessed with every advantage of birth 
and education and fortune, totally lacking in the 
sterling qualities that go to make the real lady 
or gentleman. Their money and social connec- 
tions may procure the title for them, but the wise 
know full well that the title is an empty one, 
wholly undeserved — all of which goes to prove 
the truth of Tennyson's assertion : "Kind hearts 
are more than coronets." 

Nothing tends so much to brighten and 
sweeten social intercourse, and make life generally 
agreeable, as the little attentions, civilities and 
courtesies which we style good manners. And 
since good manners are the natural outgrowth of 
character, and kindness of heart, it stands to rea- 
son that one of our chiefest concerns should be 
the cultivation of the heart and the affections, 
and the upbuilding of character, through a devel- 
opment of the moral sense. This applies partic- 
ularly to those who are responsible for the train- 
ing of the young. It should be regarded as one 
ci the principal features in the education of the 



Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 177 

child. No amount of book learning, or worldly 
success, will compensate for a lack of good man- 
ners; while the possession of genuinely good 
manners will make ample amends for many little 
gaps in the field of human knowledge. 



H 



[August 10, 1910.] 

THE CANKER— SELFISHNESS 

OLY WRIT tells us that "no one liveth unto 
himself" alone, and those who seek to live 
for themselves only, are misfits in the plan of crea- 
tion. Selfishness is the baneful canker-worm that 
eats out the heart of every otherwise good deed. 
There is no more lovable or useful member of 
society than the unselfish man or woman, and 
no more disgusting creature than the chronic self- 
seeker. It is by helping others that we can best 
succeed in saving ourselves, and accomplishing 
the purpose for which we were made. This is 
what Christ meant when He said that "he who 
loveth his life shall lose it, and he who loseth his 
life for my sake shall find it." It is, as a rule, 
the selfish who are afflicted with what the old 
Latins termed the "taedium vitae" — the insuffera- 
ble ennui that makes life not worth living. Those 
who live for others rarely find life dull or unin- 
teresting, still less unendurable. Our heartiest 
admiration goes out to the noble men and women, 
reared in the lap of luxury, having all they re- 
quire, needing not to work for themselves, but 



178 Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 

who, nevertheless, are willing to devote their 
time and means and energy to the physical and 
moral betterment of their kind. It is no mere 
empty compliment to such to style them the "salt 
of the earth." And well would it be for the world 
if all others in the same position would but fol- 
low these shining examples. No better advice 
could be given the idle and selfish rich than that 
contained in the words of Chalmers : "Live for 
something. Do good and leave behind you a 
monument of virtue that the storm of time can 
never destroy. Write your name in kindness, 
love and mercy on the hearts of thousands you 
come into contact with year by year ; you will 
never be forgotten. Your name, your deeds, will 
be as legible on the hearts you leave behind as 
the stars on the brow of evening. Good deeds 
will shine as the stars of heaven." 

Unfortunately, selfishness often creeps into 
our very best deeds, and sweet charity itself is 
at times but sheer self-seeking. Many there are 
who give without a particle of genuine love or 
sympathy. They give with the feeling that they 
are investing their money in the Bank of Heaven 
and with the expectation of getting a good, 
big rate of interest. They are everlastingly think- 
ing of the return: "Cast thy bread upon the 
waters and it shall return to thee," etc. So long 
as this remains the sole incentive to human help- 
fulness, there can be no life or heart in it. It is 
at best but an emasculated philanthropy. The 
cold, supercilious dispenser of alms, who throws 
a coin to the indigent as he would throw a bone 



Mers Hints: Morai, and Social. 179 

to a dog, seems to forget that helper and helped 
are both made of the same common clay; that 
the mendicant is not necessarily, or always, a 
brazen and thick-skinned sham ; that the poor 
and ignorant are not without feeling, pride and 
sensitiveness, and that to some of them this en- 
forced beggary is as bitter as gall and worm- 
wood. Small wonder that we hear from time to 
time of self-respecting poor people brought to the 
hospitals on the verge of starvation because they 
shrank from throwing themselves on the mis- 
called charity of such unfeeling fellow-mortals. 

Again, there are many who realize well enough 
their duty of helping the needy, but they give 
their help in such a way as not to stint them- 
selves in the least — putting off their deeds of 
charity till death deprives them of any further 
opportunity of enjoying earthly goods. Speaking 
to such, Francis Bacon once said: "Defer not 
charities till death ; for certainly if a man weigh 
it rightly, he that doth so is rather liberal of 
another man's than of his own." Fortunate and 
worthy of all esteem is the rich man of whom 
we can say what Cicero once said of a certain 
Posthumus : "In his pursuit of wealth it was 
plain that he sought, not food for avarice, but an 
instrument of doing good." 



180 Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 
[August ly, ioio.] 

HONEST THINKING AND DOING 

IN Polonius advice to his son we notice that 
special emphasis is laid on honesty or sin- 
cerity in our dealings with self: 

This above all: To thine own self be true; 
And it must follow, as the night the day, 
Thou canst not then be false to any man. 

Of a piece with this wise counsel is the time- 
honored adage "Let justice be done, though the 
heavens should fall," for honesty, fairness and 
sincerity in arriving at a decision must neces- 
sarily precede justice in our dealings with our- 
selves and others. Needless to say, this absolute, 
unflinching honesty or openness of mind is by no 
means a superabundant commodity. It is not 
always an easy thing to seek and follow the truth 
whithersoever it leads, whether it be for or 
against us. On the contrary, it requires fortitude 
of no common order. For the truth often clashes 
with self-interest, and at times with lifelong 
friendships and deeply cherished convictions; and 
the man who can thoroughly divest himself of 
bias and prejudice, ever keeping his mind in an 
open or receptive attitude, like a tabula rasa or 
a wireless telegraph receiver, ready to accept the 
message of truth whether palatable or unpalata- 
ble, from whatsoever quarter it comes, regardless 
of consequences, is a veritable hero. He is, too, 
a man whom we can trust absolutely and im- 



Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 181 

plicitly, for, as Polonius remarks, if he be true 
to himself, there is very little danger of his being 
false to another. Being just to himself, he will 
naturally be just to everyone else. The two go 
hand in hand. 

This mental poise, or openness of mind, is 
absolutely essential to the attainment of truth; 
and those who knowingly fail to cultivate it are 
not really honest with, or true to, themselves. 
The full radiance of truth never lights on the 
blind and prejudiced partisan. The fact of the 
matter is he doesn't vvant the truth. If he studies 
■_he other side at all, it is only to pick flaws in it, 
or to find arguments to bolster up his own posi- 
tion. He is not willing to recognize a truth which 
runs counter to his preconceived views. And 
since it is only the truths of mathematics, or the 
exact sciences, that compel our assent, nolens 
volens, it is easy enough for such a one to re- 
main in his error with perfect complacency and 
self-satisfaction. 

Even in matters of conscience we know that 
men often manage to convince themselves that 
they are doing no wrong when every impartial 
onlooker sees clearly that their conduct is utterly 
at variance with the principles of the moral law. 
Of course, a change like this in the average, nor- 
mal man doesn't take place in a single day. It 
is a gradual process, the result of long-continued 
mental dishonesty or insincerity with one's self; 
it is the natural consequence of looking at only 
one side of a question — the side that favors his 
interests or his prejudices — to the exclusion of 



182 Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 

the othen At first, perhaps, his methods will 
give rise to some qualms of conscience; but oft- 
repeated acts of the kind soon blind and harden 
him, dull and even deaden his moral sense, and 
eventually land him in the slough which we are 
wont to style an elastic, or india-rubber, con- 
science. For, after all, conscience is not an au- 
tomaton, or a mariner's compass unerringly point- 
ing out the way without our assistance. It is 
human reason itself pronouncing judgment on the 
morality of this or that particular concrete act, 
and, like every other judgment, depends largely 
on our moral dispositions. From repeated twist- 
ings of conscience some people come to have such 
little regard for truth that they will defend either 
side of a question with equal ability, and equal 
insincerity. 

We can put no confidence in the man who is 
mentally dishonest with himself, who tries to 
convince himself that wrong is right, who is ever 
on the alert for excuses, endeavoring to patch up 
his conscience and square his immorality with 
the moral law. When one has arrived at this 
pass his case is hopeless, at least until he changes 
his viewpoint. Far better the man who does 
wrong occasionally without making any attempt 
at self-deception, and who is honest enough with 
himself to admit his error. There is some hope 
for him. 

We cannot insist too often or too strongly on 
the evils of bias or prejudice, or on the necessity 
of looking upon mental honesty as a primal fac- 
tor in the training of youth. Truth is, of course, 



Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 183 

the end of education, but without openness of 
mind — a mind wide open to conviction and free 
from prejudice — the attainment of truth is im- 
possible. As well try to square the circle or scale 
the moon. 



[August 24, 19 10.] 

SOME QUEER BUSINESS ETHICS 

WHAT we are going to say is not intended 
either for thoroughly honest men or for 
the consciously and hopelessly dishonest, but 
rather for the class to which we referred in last 
Wednesday's article — the men who are mentally 
dishonest with themselves, but have still some 
lingering regard for the moral law and some lit- 
tle fear of God, and are, in consequence, ever 
on the lookout for excuses to salve their con- 
science. How persons who resort to false weights 
and short measures, and other tricks of the kind, 
can succeed in even half convincing themselves 
that they are doing no great wrong, is too deep 
a mystery for us to fathom. But many of them 
do it, nevertheless, by devious ways and pro- 
cesses of reasoning known only to themselves. 
We are not talking at random. We have often 
met the type of whom we speak. 

It is amazing to find the large number of 
men who seem to have one code of ethics for 
their private lives and another, entirely different, 
in their business dealings. Perhaps it would be 
nearer the truth to say that they practically dis- 



184 Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 

card ethics altogether in commercial life. We 
could scarcely find a more striking or a more 
glaring instance of this than the alarming condi- 
tion which has been repeatedly brought to our 
notice in the last few years — the wholesale adul- 
teration of foods and drinks. The recent re- 
searches of Government experts have given us an 
idea of the extent to which this criminal practice 
is carried. So widespread, in fact, was the evil 
prior to this investigation, that most of us have 
been, unknown to ourselves, in perpetual danger 
of death from slow, and sometimes even from 
quick, poisoning; for many of the adulterants 
used are nothing short of rank poisons. How 
any man with a shred of conscience, or with even 
a shred of common humanity, can resort to such 
vile methods of money-making, or can even re- 
motely connive at them, passes our comprehen- 
sion. While eminent physicians the world over 
are laboring strenuously to conquer disease, or 
at least to arrest its ravages, these sordid users 
of adulterants, these human vampires, are doing 
their level best to thwart the efforts of medical 
science by adopting the very surest means of 
sowing the seeds of disease and death. Yet many 
of them are held in high esteem by their fellow- 
citizens in private life. Not a few are philanthro- 
pists — God save the mark! — wringing vast sums 
of blood-money out the public by their worse 
than dishonest wiles, and throwing back a coin 
or two as a sop ; doing pretended charity with one 
hand, while the other cruelly slaughters thousands 
of their fellow-men. 



Mkre Hints: Moral and Social. 185 

Where poisonous ingredients are used, or any- 
other adulterants likely to imperil human life 
or prove injurious to health, it stands to reason 
that mere fines, however heavy, are not sufficient 
penalties. And the same holds true of all decayed 
or diseased foods. The thing should undoubtedly 
be made a grave penitentiary offense, for we arc 
not going out of bounds, or indulging in extrava- 
gant talk, when we say that such practices are 
closely akin to slow murder — and a murder all 
the more unjustifiable, since it is done not in the 
heat of passion or for the sake of revenge, but 
coolly and deliberately, merely as a means of in- 
creasing the brutal manufacturer's wealth. We 
have no sympathy with the homicide, but we 
can at least make some allowance for the man- 
slaughterer worked up to a frenzy at sight of 
some real or fancied wrong. We can make none 
for the heartless wretch who coolly sells human 
life, and thrives and battens on the shattered 
constitutions of his fellow-men. 

True, in the case we speak of — food adultera- 
tion — the Government has already taken serious 
steps to stamp out the evil. But, in spite of its 
efforts, the law will be violated; and when these 
violations are discovered, they ought to be visited 
by a punishment that will make the law-breakers 
remember for all time, or at least for the rest of 
their careers. They richly deserve all the punish- 
ment they can get — and more — for they are a 
real and perpetual menace to public health and 
life. 



186 Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 
[August 31, 1910.] 

THE BURIED TALENT 

WHEN we wish to characterize, the restless 
and selfish man eternally striving to reach 
the top rung of the ladder of fame — by fair means 
if possible; if not, by foul — we say he is ambi- 
tious, thereby implying that ambition is something 
evil. On the other hand, we say of the habitually 
lazy or apathetic individual, the man who lacks 
initiative and energy and interest in life, that he 
is utterly without ambition, implying in this sec- 
ond instance that ambition is something good. In 
the more precise languages of antiquity they have 
different words to express these opposite phases, 
and it is a pity that, in spite of our bulky lexi- 
cons, people feel themselves necessitated to em- 
ploy the same word now in a good, again in an 
evil sense. However, provided we understand 
thoroughly the things for which the term stands, 
the term itself is a matter of small importance; 
and it seems to be generally understood that 
there is a laudable as well as a blamable ambition. 
The latter is the kind which Wolsey charged 
Cromwell .to fling away, the sin by which "fell the 
angels." It consists in trying to obtain a place 
or office for which one is unfitted; or even in 
endeavoring to secure, by unfair methods, a posi- 
tion for which one may be thoroughly equipped. 
The other kind is simply the effort to do the 
greatest possible amount of good with the talents 
which God has given us; and this kind is not 
only a right, but likewise a positive duty. 



Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 187 

Apropos of this, the reader may call to mind 
the words of commendation spoken by Christ to 
the servants who made good use of their five, 
or their two, talents; and the severe condemna- 
tion uttered against the one who hid his talent 
in a napkin, or buried it underground, instead of 
putting it out to usury and making it profitable 
to his master. The gifts of God were not given 
us for ourselves only, to be used or abused at 
pleasure, or to be locked up and looked at from 
time to time, as the miser feasts his eyes on 
his unproductive hoard. Those who realize the 
meaning of the Fatherhood of God and the brother- 
hood of men, or our inter-dependence one upon 
another, will not need to be reminded of this 
truth. Strange to say, there are some who seem 
to regard the hiding of their talents as an act of 
virtue. It is nothing of the kind. Far from it. 
True, it is an act both of virtue and of common 
sense to refuse to take to ourselves the credit 
for whatever gifts we may have, and to avoid 
seeking our own aggrandizement in their use, 
but it is certainly a false modesty which makes 
the receiver withhold due credit from the Giver, 
and thwart the Almighty's plans. Christ Him- 
self is our w r arrant for this. "No man," He tells 
us, "lights a candle and puts it under a bushel, 
but upon a candlestick that it may give light to 
all who are in the house. * * * Let your light 
so shine before men that they may see your good 
works and glorify your Father who is in Heaven." 

Others again, weighing the vast amount of 
physical and moral evil in the world and the com- 



1SS Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 

parative little that individual effort can do to 
mitigate it, allow themselves to drift into the 
slough of despairing pessimism, taking for their 
motto: "Cui bono" — What's the use? If all the 
world reasoned thus, assuredly the world would 
soon go to perdition. It may be very little that 
the single individual is able to accomplish, but we 
know that "every little helps," and many of these 
little helps thrown together mean a great deal in 
the long run. Taken separately, our feeble efforts 
may be but a mere drop in the bucket, but, after 
all, it is the little drops that eventually fill the 
bucket, and the ocean, too, for that matter. 

In truth the important question is, not whether 
we have one, or two, or five talents, but the use 
we are making of what we have. The usefulness 
of a machine depends on the harmonious working 
of all its parts, little as well as big. The big 
ones attract more notice; the little ones may be 
at times scarcely visible ; but let them once cease 
to perform their functions, and soon the whole 
machine will stop. And the same holds true of 
the mechanism of human society. Each and every 
one of us has his own part to play — his own 
work to do — and his real social worth is to be 
gauged, not by the character of his work, but by 
the manner in which he does it. 



Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 189 
[September y, 1910.] 

APART FROM THE CROWD 

IN this extremely rapid and practical age of 
ours there is a well-defined tendency, not. 
of course, among thinkers themselves, but among 
many of the rank and file, to overlook or under- 
rate the social and individual value of serious 
thought or sober reflection. From the habit of 
contrasting theory and practice they sometimes 
talk and act as thought the two were set in fixed 
opposition. The word "theory" immediately sug- 
gests to them a castle in the air — a something 
too utterly childish or fanciful for the level- 
headed man of affairs. Evidently such people 
forget that there are sensible and well-founded, 
as well as false and ridiculous, theories, and, 
furthermore, that practice itself is generally based 
on theory. We don't mean to say that all think- 
ers or theorists are great men, but certainly all 
great men have been thinkers, theorists, "dream- 
ers," if you will ; and it is precisely the carrying 
out of their "dreams" and theories, that made 
them great. Were it not for the "dreamers" and 
theorists, we, of the present, would be standing 
where the race stood thousands of years ago. It 
was not the busy man of affairs, but the 
"dreamer" working in his silent cabinet, that 
taught us how to use electricity, and to dominate 
the other natural forces which have revolutionized 
the modern world. All the useful arts, in fact, 
are based on the findings of these "dreamers" 
and theorists. When we speak of the French 



190 Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 

Revolution the first names that occur to most 
of us are those of Robespierre, Danton, Marat, 
etc., but we lose sight of the fact that its real 
authors were Voltaire, Rousseau and the other 
radical philosophers of the eighteenth century. 
In reality it is the thinkers and theorists and 
"dreamers" who rule the world. They are the 
power behind the throne. They it is who con- 
struct and set in motion the machinery that puts 
forth the good and the evil things of life. The 
brethren of Joseph had nothing but contempt for 
the "dreamer of dreams," as they styled him, but 
after-events proved that the "dreamer" was the 
most practical and level-headed of all his father's 
sons. 

To what, it may be asked, does all this lead? 
The intent is to remind us that serious thought 
or reflection is at the bottom of all wholesome 
and profitable action, both social and individual. 
Without it there can be neither social progress 
nor individual betterment. In the days when 
men lived more slowly and deliberately they had 
more time, and perhaps a more favorable environ- 
ment, for reflection. In this age of bustle and 
noise and excitement many haven't the time, or 
at least won't take the time, for it — and thereby 
prove themselves their own worst enemies, for 
those who neglect frequent and serious self-ex- 
amination will never amount to much, either for 
themselves or the world at large. In the words 
of the old prophet of Israel: "With desolation 
is the earth made desolate because there is none 
that thinketh in his heart." To know and play 



Mere; Hints: Moral and Social,. 191 

our part in the great drama of human life, we 
must first learn to know ourselves — our capabili- 
ties and our limitations, our weak and our strong 
points, the mainsprings of our action and the dan- 
gers that beset our path — and certainly this 
knowledge cannot be acquired in the midst of 
"the madding crowd." Persons of a religious 
bent, realizing that "the Lord is not in the whirl- 
wind" and counting on the divine promise, "I 
will lead her into the wilderness, and there speak 
to her soul," make it a practice to withdraw, at 
stated times, from the daily routine of human 
activities, and give themselves up to self-introspec- 
tion. It is verily a holy and a wholesome prac- 
tice, good not only for religious people, but like- 
wise for all who take life and its duties seriously. 
We may not all have the same amount of time 
to devote to it, or even the same high motives, 
but without a doubt we would all find ourselves 
morally and socially bettered by getting apart 
from the crowd now and then, to take an inven- 
tory of our moral stock. It is at such times that 
the greatest and best thoughts come to us. If 
there were more reflection and self-examination 
in the world, to enable us to know ourselves as 
we really are, there would be far less crime, and 
fewer misfits in the social fabric. Nothing can 
be of greater moment for us than to raise our 
thoughts from time to time above the gross and 
sordid, the material and the mercenary, to make 
us realize that we have a rational and spiritual, 
as well as an animal, nature. As the Emperor 
Marcus Aurelius says in his "Meditations": "Such 



192 Mere Hints: Moral and Social. 

as are thy habitual thoughts, such also will be 
the character of thy mind, for the soul is dyed 
by the thoughts." 



OCT 3 1910 



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